


what skin does

by Lirazel



Category: Infinite (Band), K-POP RPF, K-pop, Korean Pop, Kpop-Fandom
Genre: F/M, Gender Issues, Gender Roles, Genderswap, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-31
Updated: 2012-12-14
Packaged: 2017-11-21 03:34:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 66,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/592978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lirazel/pseuds/Lirazel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i> He tries to fit this into his mind, shoving and shoving to get it inside, but it’s too big, it’s like trying to get a couch through a door that’s too small to accommodate it—no matter how he turns and angles it, it just won’t go in.  Sungyeol is a girl.  </i>  </p>
<p>Sungyeol wakes up as a girl.  Chaos, predictably, ensues.  Crack, obviously.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

_“Skin had hope, that's what skin does.”_

_-_ Two Countries _, Naomi Shihab Nye_

\--

When Woohyun walks out of the bedroom, there’s a girl standing in the middle of the living room. He freezes: this is not something he sees every day—or ever, really, unless they’re filming and it’s writer noonas; otherwise women aren’t allowed in the dorm. But they don’t have anything like that on the schedule today, and this girl doesn’t look anything like a writer noona at all. He watches her warily for a moment, taking in the long (longlonglong) pale legs— _fuck_ , those are some amazing legs, look at that definition—up to the flare of her narrow hips in a pair of men’s boxers, the tangle of wavy hair over her shoulders, the swell of her small breasts under the loose fabric of her t-shirt. Woohyun is caught somewhere between total confusion at the presence of a woman in their dorm (sasaeng? Possibly? But how did she get in, and wearing that? Or did one of the guys sneak someone in? She certainly looks like she just got out of bed. But none of them _would_ —if Sunggyu didn’t kill them, their CEO certainly would) and arousal at how hot she looks. The only girls he’s ever close to anymore are either crowds taking his picture and screaming his name from a distance or other idols and entertainers, shellacked within an inch of their life just like the male idols are. It’s how the business is, but as beautiful as many of them are and as much as he likes a lot of them, it makes them feel a little distant, untouchable. Nothing like this girl, sleep-rumpled and _right here_. He doesn’t even know her, and for all he knows she’s a lunatic stalker, but that doesn’t stop him from wanting to reach out to touch her.

But he can’t do that, of course, and he wouldn’t anyway, because he's not some sleaze who would touch some girl who doesn’t know him. Still, he can’t stand here watching her look around in confusion all day, so he steps forward, hoping his morning breath isn’t too bad. “Uh,” he says, flattening his hair—he just woke up, it’s got to be a mess. “Can I help you?”

She jumps a little at the sound of his voice, and then she turns to stare at him with wide eyes, and he knows that face. 

Woohyun only just manages to stay upright.

“Hyung! Hyung, I’ve got tits!” she cries, pretty face crumpling up with emotion.

Woohyun thinks he might just throw up. Because that voice is an octave higher than the one he’s so used to hearing, but it cracks in a way that’s so familiar it couldn’t possibly be anyone else’s. 

“…Sungyeol?” 

Woohyun’s throat has closed up so that the name barely squeezes out, and maybe that’s why this girl—Sungyeol—what the _fuck_?—acts like she didn’t even hear it.

“Woohyun, look at this!” she—he?—says, showing that lack of respect for age roles that only Sungyeol ever gets away with, switching back and forth between honorific and name as though there’s no distinction between the two. But Woohyun doesn’t have time to dwell on that, because this girl-who-might-be-Sungyeol cups her breasts through her shirt, and Woohyun chokes. “They’re real, Woohyun, they feel just like the real thing, like, like bags of pudding on my chest and—“ She, he, whatever sounds half-amazed, half-terrified, like it’s impossible to decide how to react to this situation. Woohyun understands, though his options are terrified or completely-in-denial.

Woohyun is looking around for something to grab hold of to keep himself on his feet when girl-Sungyeol races over to him, grabs his hand in hers—her fingers are just as long and elegant as Sungyeol’s, but they’re softer, if that’s even possible—and brings it down to her crotch. Woohyun thinks he’s going to drop dead on the spot. 

“Woohyun, my dick is gone!”

Woohyun jerks his hand back so fast he almost falls over, but not before he feels that, yes, Sungyeol’s dick is gone and in its place are ladyparts. Because this is definitely Sungyeol: it looks like Sungyeol (well, except for the obvious differences), it sounds like Sungyeol, and up close it even smells like Sungyeol. It has to be Sungyeol. Except that it can’t be Sungyeol. Except that it is.

Woohyun has to sit down. On the ground. So he does. He sits right down and he tries to fit this into his mind, shoving and shoving to get it inside, but it’s too big, it’s like trying to get a couch through a door that’s too small to accommodate it—no matter how he turns and angles it, it just won’t go in. Sungyeol is a girl. Sungyeol has tits. Sungyeol is a girl. Sungyeol’s dick is gone. Sungyeol is a girl. Sungyeol is a girl. Sungyeol is a girl.

“Hyung!” Sungyeol drops down onto his—her?—knees in front of Woohyun, right up in Woohyun’s face, and when Woohyun’s eyes focus, he sees that there are differences now in Sungyeol’s face, but they’re subtle. His face is a little smaller, his lips a little more curved, his eyelashes a tad more curled, his nose just a bit softer in its lines. His hair is long and wavy and black as it frames the more feminine curve to the shape of his face. This is clearly still Sungyeol, just Sungyeol with more estrogen and a different chromosome or something, and Woohyun wants to screw up his eyes and retreat back into sleep because this has to be a dream. This isn’t the first time he’s dreamed weird things about Sungyeol, but this is even more twisted than his mind usually conjures up, and holy fuck, is he about to start hyperventilating?

Something smacks his shoulder and he blinks his eyes open to see that girl-Sungyeol’s face is still _right there_ , those huge doe eyes staring at him. “Hyung! Stop freaking out! I’m a girl! What are we going to do? Help me!”

Woohyun stares and stares and stares, and then he scrambles to his feet, throwing himself towards the door of his bedroom. “Hyung!” he yells desperately as he hurls himself into the room. “Hyung!”

 

 

Sunggyu is absolutely no help whatsoever. He takes one look at Sungyeol—who is cupping his tits again and _can someone please stop him what the fuck does he think he’s doing_?—and then refuses to look at him again, muttering things under his breath and hitting his head with his hands.

“Hyung, stop this!” Woohyun demands, punching him in the shoulder. “You have to get it together so we can figure out what’s going on and what we’re going to do about it!” He glances over at Sungyeol, who is now running his fingers through his hair, tugging on the ends as though it’s a wig he expects to be able to pull off at any moment. It looks really soft, that hair, and shiny in a way that isn’t even slightly fake-looking—actually, texture-wise it’s a lot like Sungyeol’s hair always is, only he’s never had it this long and black before, and now instead of not even brushing the tops of his shoulders, it’s curling around his shoulder blades. Woohyun drags his gaze away and focuses on thumping Sunggyu on the back. “Hyung, snap out of it!”

But Sunggyu just shakes his head furiously, sneaking tiny glances at Sungyeol and then looking away immediately like he just saw the most terrifying sight in the world. 

“Hyung, what’s going on? Why is everyone being so loud?”

Woohyun turns and sees Sungjong coming out of his room, Hoya right behind him, both of them still in pajamas. They both stop when they see a woman in the room, Sungjong straightening his shoulders and shaking his hair out of his eyes, Hoya flexing his arms a little and grinning. Woohyun is about to snap at them for being so ridiculous when Sungyeol drops the lock of hair he’d been examining and looks over at the new arrivals. 

And then Sungjong and Hoya’s mouths drop open in unison, both of them going an alarming shade of white. “… _fuck_!” Hoya whispers harshly. 

“Does—does Sungyeol-hyung have a twin sister we never knew about?” Sungjong asks, voice shaking as he stares.

“Ya, Lee Sungjong!” Sungyeol says, testily. “Don’t be stupid—and stop looking at me like that!”

“Hyung?” Sungjong’s voice is still trembling for all he’s clearly trying to control himself. “Are you…?”

“I’m a girl! Yes, I’m a girl, okay? I don’t know what happened—I went to bed like always and then I woke up this morning and I’m a girl! Quit looking at me like I’m an alien or something!”

Sungyeol’s voice is shaky, and Woohyun reaches out automatically to put a hand on the small of his back like he often does when Sungyeol is upset, only he stops himself just in time. The one thing he knows—absolutely _knows_ —is that he cannot touch Sungyeol when he’s like this. Not even a casual touch like the ones they so often share. He can’t. 

Sungjong has respectfully averted his eyes, still pale but trying not to upset Sungyeol more, but Hoya grins wolfishly. “You look pretty hot, _Yeolna_ ,” he says teasingly, and Woohyun sees Sungyeol’s face tighten. Despite the small differences in his face, that expression is exactly the one Sungyeol always makes when his pride is stung, and Woohyun kind of wants to smash Hoya’s face in.

“You better watch it, Lee Howon,” Sungyeol says warningly, voice cracking as he takes half a step forward, raising his fist, and his arms are really nicely defined, just like they always are, but they’re even thinner than usual now—in this body Sungyeol is still lanky but even slighter, smaller-boned. He doesn’t look like he could do damage to a child.

“Or what?” Hoya taunts, his grin growing wider. “Little girl is going to beat me up?”

Sungyeol’s eyes narrow and this time Woohyun really is about to step forward and do something he’ll probably regret, but they’re interrupted by the sound of Dongwoo’s bleary voice.

“Why's everybody being so loud?” 

Everyone turns to see Dongwoo stumbling out of the bedroom and swiping at his eyes, Myungsoo following behind him with a scrunched-up face. Woohyun and Sungyeol exchange glances; if those two are awake, they must have been _really_ loud. 

Sungyeol turns back to them, pulling his shoulders back as though to give himself a bit of courage (he clearly has no idea what it does to his body, and Woohyun tries to remind himself of that, counting backwards from a hundred by fives in his head), and then he says, “I’m a girl. We don’t know why or how, but I’m a girl.” Woohyun stares at him, but Sungyeol just shrugs, eyes telling him that he didn’t want to go through what he just did with Hoya and Sungjong again. Might as well get it all out at once.

Just like Hoya and Sungjong, Dongwoo’s mouth drops open—and Dongwoo has an inordinately large mouth, so it looks even more comical except that this is not a situation in which anything is funny at all—but Myungsoo’s stays shut, his eyes going so wide they look like they might roll right out of their sockets. There’s a moment of silence as they both stare.

Then: “Yeollie?” Myungsoo rasps, very quietly. “Is that you?”

“Of course it’s me!” Sungyeol snaps, propping his fists on his hips—and now he actually has hips to prop them on. “I just said it was. Don’t I look like me?”

Myungsoo just stares some more, face totally blank as he cocks his head. “…mostly.”

Sungyeol shakes his head, turning away. “I’m a girl.” His laugh is watery and incredulous. “I’m actually a girl.” 

“How the fuck did this happen?” Sungjong demands sharply, but nobody has an answer.

“What the fuck are we going to do?” Hoya adds, giving up his mockery for the moment, but that question is just as unanswerable.

Everyone’s at a loss, and as they stand around asking stupid question, Sungyeol has drifted over to the corner and is now running his hands all over his body, over hips that are wider than they ever have been before, over a butt that’s just as flat, a t-shirt clad belly that’s just a little curved. Woohyun shouldn’t be looking, he really shouldn’t be looking (he’s wearing sweatpants, for fuck’s sake, they don’t hide anything), but he can’t quite bring himself to look away, not until he becomes aware of Sunggyu muttering to himself again, which finally breaks the spell enough for him to close his eyes and remind himself to breathe.

Woohyun wants to hyperventilate some more—he’s never wanted anything more than he wants that, actually, except possibly for this to be a dream—but if Sunggyu’s not going to hold it together, _someone_ has to, and he’s always been the leader’s right hand, in practice if not in title, so he takes a deep breath and tries to focus, tries to remain calm.

Except when he opens his eyes, Dongwoo is over by Sungyeol and his hands have joined Sungyeol’s in the appraisal of Sungyeol’s body, and of course he _would_ , because Dongwoo’s reaction to everything is to touch it, to get to know it by feeling it (or by biting it, which Woohyun is not even going to _think_ about now), and of course he’d want to get a handle on this whole insane thing by using his hands, but it looks so much worse than it usually does when he touches the other members. “Sungyeol, you have tits!” Dongwoo says, squeezing said parts, and Woohyun feels like the top of his head is going to blow off.

“I know!” Sungyeol says, and he actually sounds kind of excited even through his incredulity, and why is hyperventilating not an option again? “But they’re kind of small, aren’t they?” he adds, looking down at them.

“They’re nice, though,” Dongwoo reassures him, still squeezing, and Woohyun thinks he might have to chop Dongwoo’s hands off. 

Instead he just storms over and smacks them away. “Hyung, stop groping him! Her!” He pauses, unsure, looking up at Sungyeol for guidance.

“Don’t call me ‘her’!” Sungyeol shouts. “I’m still me! I’m not a ‘her’!”

Well, that answers that question. “Sorry—I’m sorry,” Woohyun says hurriedly. “I know. I know you’re you,” he adds, and Sungyeol just nods, eyes distraught again. Woohyun holds his gaze until he notices that Dongwoo is making grabby hands in Sungyeol’s direction again, inching towards him, so Woohyun grabs him by the shoulders and steers him away. Hoya and Sungjong are arguing about something, Sunggyu is still muttering to himself, and Myungsoo is just staring like he thinks his gaze is a tractor beam that will pull Sungyeol over to him. 

This is all a little much for Woohyun, so he pushes Dongwoo’s shoulders to get him to sit down and raises his voice. “Okay! Everybody just shut up and sit down!”

Silence drops like a hammer and everyone immediately obeys, even Sunggyu, all of them jerking out of whatever haze they were in and dropping to the floor, probably more out of shock than anything else: Woohyun doesn’t often yell; that’s Sunggyu’s job when it’s necessary, and Woohyun smoothes it over with humor and encouragement afterwards. But there’s nothing else to do, so he breathes in deep, looking at the members and trying to think of a rational next step.

“Okay,” he says, trying not look at Sungyeol’s legs where they’re folded as he sits cross-legged. “Let’s call the hyungs.”

 

 

Things don’t get much better after the call—the manager-hyungs freak out, too. For a while there’s a lot of talking and yelling and stuff—mostly, “How could this happen?” and “I told you I don’t know! I just woke up like this!”—and when they leave, all of them already making phone calls as they hurry out the door, they make Sungyeol swear not to leave the dorm. “We can’t let someone see a girl leaving Infinite’s dorm. Do you know what kind of scandal that would cause?”

“Yeah,” Sungyeol answers sarcastically. “Almost as big of one as me _turning into a girl for no reason_.”

Woohyun is glad that Sungyeol’s back to his typical snarky self, even if his voice is cracking more than usual, and even if his physical self is still so strangely different and yet similar. It’s the similarities that are the hardest thing to deal with, he thinks, the ways in which this is so obviously the Lee Sungyeol he’s known for years. If he looked like a completely different person like in a drama or something, it might be harder to believe it was Sungyeol, but the situation itself would feel a little less…this.

“Okay. Okay. First thing’s first,” Sunggyu says, nodding emphatically. He’s pulled himself back together since the first decision to call the managers was made, though Woohyun notices he still refuses to look at Sungyeol. “Get him something else to wear, he looks obscene.”

“You don’t have to talk about me like I’m not in the room, hyung,” Sungyeol spits, crossing his arms in a way that makes Woohyun feel hot all over. He looks away himself. “I’m female, not deaf.”

“Right, right, sorry,” Sunggyu answers, and Woohyun kind of stares at him because any time Sungyeol has ever used that tone with him before, Sunggyu has shut him down with his leader-glare and a lecture about respect. But now he seems ruffled, actually apologetic. “Sungyeol, can you get Sungjong to help you find something else to wear? Something a little less…that?”

Sungyeol only looks the slightest bit mollified, but he goes with Sungjong easily enough, a bouncy Dongwoo and a still-staring Myungsoo following after. Woohyun is about to shout at them, but thankfully Sungjong glances back, catching Woohyn’s eyes and nodding in understanding. He pushes Sungyeol into the room before he goes in himself, slamming the door in Dongwoo and Myungsoo’s face. _And to think I used to hate it when he slammed doors,_ Woohyun thinks, turning away from Dongwoo and Myungsoo who are staring at the door in surprise.

“Thank God we’re on hiatus right now, this would be a disaster otherwise,” Sunggyu is saying, massing his temples. 

“Um, I think it already is a disaster,” Woohyun points out. “Sungyeol has changed _genders_. I think that’s the definition of disaster.” Or _a_ definition at least. Whatever.

“I know. I know. But it’s at least a manageable one like this.” Woohyun knows his face is covered with disbelief, but Sunggyu isn’t paying attention and just hurries on. “Okay. So we keep him here, cancel his schedules—we’ll tell everyone he’s sick. They’ll believe it, he’s always sick.”

“And the rest of us carry on like nothing happened?” Woohyun asks sarcastically, though he knows what the answer is going to be; this is Sunggyu, after all.

“Exactly. We keep up the impression that nothing’s going on at all. At least until we can sort this out.”

“And how exactly do you suggest we do that?” Woohyun asks. “We don’t know how this _happened_ , how on earth are we going to fix it?” _I’ve never believed you’re almighty like you sometimes want to convince yourself, Kim Sunggyu. But if there was ever a time to prove you really are unstoppable when it comes to Infinite, this is that moment._

“And what if it’s permanent?” Hoya pipes up. “What if he stays like this?”

Woohyun and Sunggyu stare at each other in horror. Neither one of them had even thought of that. Woohyun can’t help it: he starts to imagine what that would be like for Sungyeol, trying to learn how to be a girl, having to give up Infinite, forming a new identity and trying to get everyone he loves to come to terms with that…. _No._ No, that is unacceptable. This _has_ to be reversible. It has to be.

“Okay, okay!” Sunggyu says, waving his hands as though trying to distract himself from another freak out. “We’re not going to think of that now. We’re just going to give it some time, see if it…sorts itself out. We’ll let the managers handle the rest, okay? They’ll talk to CEO-nim and if there’s a solution to find, he’ll find it. For now we just have to try to keep our heads. Oh, for fuck’s sake, that’s almost worse!”

Woohyun spins to see what Sunggyu is looking at over his shoulder and when he gets a good view, he has to agree. Sungyeol is shifting uncomfortably in the doorway, decked out in a pair of Sungjong’s stretchy yoga pants—“I’m the only one who’s got an S-line, after all, and Sungyeol-hyung has hips now,” Sungjong explains later—that are less stretchy and more clingy, and a t-shirt Woohyun recognizes as one of Dongwoo’s. Since Sungyeol is a couple of inches shorter than he usually is and his shoulders more narrow, the shirt fits well enough, except that it’s pulled tight over his breasts and it’s kind of cold in the room so—

“We are getting him a bra,” Sunggyu says, studiously not looking at Sungyeol. In fact, he’s staring at the floor like it’s the most interesting thing he’s ever seen. Woohyun thinks that might be the safest plan, so he does the same. “Now. Right now.”

“Are you even wearing underwear?” Hoya asks, grinning so his canines show.

“Where would I get ladies’ underwear, you ass?” Sungyeol demands. “Are you hiding some in your room, perv?”

“Bra!” Sunggyu barks. “Now!”

The question of where to get one is raised, and Sungjong helpfully reminds them that they share a building with female idols. Hoya makes a call and Eunji arrives minutes later in a ballcap and with a duffle bag flung over her shoulder. 

“Howon-oppa, why did you want me to bring—oh!” Her eyebrows fly up when she sees Sungyeol, then dive back down in recognition. “Are you…?”

“Yeah,” Sungyeol answers brusquely. “I’m Sungyeol.”

“Oh.” She blinks a couple of times, then shakes her head as though to clear it. “Okay. I’m not even going to ask.”

“It wouldn’t do you any good,” Sungjong offers. “None of us know either.”

“Okay. Well, then, I brought one of everyone’s to try out,” she informs Sungyeol, looking him up and down as though to assess his size. Sungyeol squirms under the scrutiny, and Woohyun again wants to punch something, though he knows Eunji’s just about the nicest person in the world and is only here to help. “You should really get sized, but we’ll see what we can do.”

She leads Sungyeol to the bedroom, and Woohyun has to grab both Myungsoo—who hasn’t said a word since the confirmation that the pretty girl was indeed his best friend, but who keeps drifting in Sungyeol’s wake with enormous, staring eyes—and Dongwoo by the collars to keep them from following. “You two perverts are staying far away from him, you hear me?” Woohyun says, shaking both of them hard. “He’s your friend and your bandmate, don’t forget that, and how are you going to feel when he turns back into himself?” _How are we all going to feel, now that we’ve seen him like this? And what is it going to do to him?_

“Woohyun, I wouldn’t do anything to him!” Dongwoo protests, sounding hurt. Myungsoo, Woohyun notes with the opposite of pleasure, doesn’t say anything, just keeps his eyes on the door that closed behind Sungyeol. 

Woohyun sighs, finally releasing them. “I know you wouldn’t ever want to hurt him, Dongwoo. But you can’t keep your hands off of anyone, and Sungyeol’s got to feel really uncomfortable already—you don’t want to make it worse.” _Also you don’t want to end up handsless because if I see you touch him like that one more time, I’m going to find a knife._

Dongwoo looks upset now, grabbing the hem of Woohyun’s shirt worriedly. “You don’t think I hurt him, do you, Nam-goon? I didn’t mean to, I just wanted to see how he felt different and—“

“No, Dongwoo,” Woohyun interrupts, peeling Dongwoo’s hands off of his shirt and slinging an arm around his shoulder (no full-on hug, not right now, not when the sight of Sungyeol’s long legs in those boxers and pebbled nipples in that t-shirt keep popping into his head). “I’m sure you didn’t. Just…try not to be so touchy until he’s back to himself again, okay?”

Dongwoo bites his lip and nods obediently. “Do you think he’ll change back soon? He’s really pretty and everything, but we can’t have a girl in Infinite.”

A girl in Infinite is the least of Woohyun’s worries; he’s too busy wondering what’s going on in Sungyeol’s head. “We aren’t going to think about that now, okay? For now we’re just going to keep calm for his sake, got it?”

They wait around awkwardly, milling through the living room. Woohyun knows they should use this time to do something productive—they’re idols, they don’t even know _how_ to waste time like this, or so he’d thought before this moment—but even something basic like making breakfast seems like too much at the moment. He finds he’s staring at the door as much as Myungsoo is, but he tells himself it’s not because he’s imagining what’s going on behind it, but because he’s wondering how awkward this must be for Sungyeol. Eunji is an attractive girl, and Sungyeol adores attractive girls, always wanting to impress them. Right now he has to feel the opposite of impressive. Eunji will be respectful and turn her back or whatever, but still. Fuck. Poor Sungyeol.

When the door opens, Myungsoo perks up like a dog who’s waiting for a squirrel at the bottom of a tree, and Woohyun glares at him until Eunji and Sungyeol emerge. Sungyeol is wearing a flowy knee-length skirt and a much more appropriate t-shirt with, Woohyun is relieved to see, a padded bra on underneath. Eunji obviously also brushed his hair, because it looks really nice now, though Woohyun notes with relief that he doesn’t have on any makeup. If she had insisted on something like that, it probably would have pushed Sungyeol over the edge, but then Eunji is probably the best girl in the world to deal with this; she’s always been, after all, something of a tomboy. 

“A skirt, Sungyeol?” Hoya asks evilly. “You’re really embracing this, aren’t you?”

Sungyeol bares his teeth at Hoya—it looks even less threatening than it usually does, and if this were any situation but the one they’re in, Woohyun would probably find it adorable. 

“Oh, be quiet, oppa,” Eunji commands before Woohyun can voice the same sentiment (though his phrasing would have been decidedly less polite). “He doesn’t have very many options. His legs are too long for any of our pants, and none of yours will fit him right either. Skirts are best, and he has the legs for them, so leave him alone.”

He really, really, really has the legs for them, Woohyun agrees. Sungyeol has always had amazing legs—Woohyun couldn’t even let himself look at them when he was in that dress and boots during the ‘Trouble Maker’ performance—but they look even better now and what the fuck he is not letting himself think about this. He’s not. He’s not.

“Thank you, Eunji,” Sunggyu says, glancing at Sungyeol for marginally longer than he has up until now, seemingly satisfied with the outfit if still uncomfortable with the whole situation. “We are very grateful.”

“I'll go through our stuff when I go back downstairs and send some more stuff up,” Eunji explains. “Outfits for a few days. Just wash them before you give them back, okay? And call me if you need anything else.” She gives Sungyeol a pat on the shoulder and then she’s gone.

“That is one weird girl,” Hoya says admiringly as the door closes behind her. “Completely unfazed.”

“Well, I’m fazed,” Sungyeol says. “I’m really, really fazed. How the fuck are we going to fix this? I can’t stay like this. I can’t.”

He wraps his arms tight around himself like it’s all just beginning to sink in—and maybe it is. Sungyeol has always had big, limpid eyes, but they somehow look even more dewy right now, his full mouth pouting so prettily, his posture so defeated, that Woohyun wants to go over there to him and—

“Lee Sungyeol.” Sunggyu marches over, stopping right in front of him and looking right at him. They’re just about the same size now—Sungyeol is still tall for a girl, but not so tall as he usually is, and Sunggyu can, for once, look him right in the eye. “We will find a way to get you back, araso? We won’t let you stay like this, I promise.” 

Sungyeol and Sunggyu are anything but close, usually treating each other with a friendly disdain, but right now Sunggyu sounds entirely sincere, his I’m-the-leader voice out but his gaze just firm instead of sharp. Sungyeol nods once and if his chin is trembling a bit, Sunggyu isn’t cruel enough to point it out. He just pats Sungyeol awkwardly on the shoulder and turns to the rest of the members spread throughout the living room.

“Okay, we’ve wasted enough time today. Let’s all get ready and something to eat and head to our schedules. Sungyeol is going to stay here, but the rest of us are going to carry on as though nothing is out of the ordinary, got it?”

“I’ll stay here with Sungyeol,” Myungsoo volunteers suddenly, and Woohyun narrows his eyes at him; Woohyun has not failed to notice that Myungsoo never removes his eyes from Sungyeol when they’re in the same room. 

Thankfully Sunggyu is Sunggyu. “No you won’t, Kim Myungsoo. You have a drama to film, and that’s where you’ll be. The rest of you know what you should be doing, so get to it. Now.”

There’s a flurry of activity as everyone scatters—Dongwoo has to physically drag Myungsoo to the bedroom to get ready—and thirty minutes later Sunggyu is shuffling everyone out the door. Woohyun pauses, though, turning to look at a dejected-looking Sungyeol who’s watching them go.

“Hey,” Woohyun says, walking back over to him (but not getting too close). “You know you’re always wanting to skip out on things, and now you get a chance to rest. Lucky bastard.”

Sungyeol shoots him an impatient look. “I’d be a lucky bastard if I weren’t a prisoner in my own home because I’m suddenly a girl. But this is not exactly the way I want to spend my time when I play hooky from schedules.”

Woohyun looks at that pale, pretty face, at the hair that’s falling in soft waves around his shoulders, and reminds himself that this is still Sungyeol. Sungyeol, his friend and partner in crime. Sungyeol, who he usually touches as casually as anything, though he’s keeping his hands in his pockets for now. “I know. You’ll probably be bored without an audience to give you attention.”

Sungyeol scoffs. “Like you can say anything—you need an audience even more than I do.”

That’s not something Woohyun particularly wants to think about, so he ignores the taunt for once. “You’ll probably have more fun than any of the rest of us anyway. And it’s just for the day, and you can catch up on the dramas you never get a chance to watch and hack into Myungsoo’s computer or something."

"You can't say it's for a day—you don't know that at all, it could be for—"

"Don't think like that!" Woohyun recognizes that his voice is a bit too sharp and dials it back some before he continues. "I’ll be back first, probably, and I’ll make something for dinner tonight, okay?”

“You’re just being all nice to me because I’m a girl now,” Sungyeol says, sounding snotty, but Woohyun knows he’s trying to cover up his own discomfort—if there’s anything Sungyeol hates, it’s being vulnerable, especially where other people can see it. Woohyun gets that.

“No, I’m being nice to you because you’re clearly freaking out even if you don’t want anyone to know it because you’re afraid of getting labeled a failed character again.”

Sungyeol looks away, and with the hair falling over his shoulder with the movement, brushing against his cheek softly, the gesture looks so feminine that Woohyun has to knot his hands up in his pockets. 

“Look, just…don’t think about it till tonight, okay? I’ll be trying to think of something all day long, and the hyungs and CEO-nim are on it—with all of us, we’ve got to come up with something, right?”

Sungyeol bites his lip and nods, but he doesn’t look like he means it, and Woohyun waves goodbye awkwardly before turning to leave. 

“ _Fuck_ ,” he breathes, as soon as the door closes behind him.

 

 

Sungyeol really, really tries to listen to Woohyun and not think about it, but it’s kind of hard. Even when he’s just sitting in front of the TV with a bowl of cup ramen, he feels strange—the underwire of Namjoo’s bra keeps cutting into his ribs, the underwear is a little big (“Sorry about that,” Eunji had said. “I brought you a new pair I’ve never worn before.” He was at least thankful for that), the mass of hair around his face and neck is distracting, and every time he glances down and sees the pretty blue fabric of the skirt he’s wearing he feels like throwing up. He doesn’t hate the idea of wearing girls’ clothes; in fact, when he’d first agreed to be Hyun* for ‘Trouble Maker,’ he’d been really excited about it. That whole thing hadn’t exactly gone the way he’d expected, and he doesn’t like to think about it much, but it was never the clothes themselves that bothered him. In fact, it was a little fun to put on a dress and a wig and see what he’d look like as a girl. Everyone had told him he was really pretty—even Sunggyu, of all people—and Sungyeol has always liked compliments. But he hadn’t liked the way the performance came across, and he likes this even less. It’s one thing to dress up like a girl for a while; it’s another thing entirely to turn into one.

He tosses his ramen away and heads back into the bedroom, pulling off Bomi’s shirt and struggling for a while to get out of the bra—how do girls _deal_ with those things?—before he finally manages it. He shucks off the skirt, too, being a little more careful with it than he usually is with clothes and laying it out on his bed. Then he takes off the too-big underwear and pulls back on his boxers and t-shirt, finds one of his hair ties from when his hair was longer, and pulls it back out of his face. That’s better. Now he can breathe.

He’d never noticed how many dramas there are about people cross-dressing before, but there are a shit ton of them, and they’re the last thing he wants to watch now. He ends up spending the day watching _City Hunter_ since it’s an old favorite, and he does hack into Myungsoo’s laptop, deleting a bunch of the less flattering pictures of himself from Myungsoo’s dozens and dozens of photography albums. 

He puts off peeing for as long as he can, but finally his bladder just won’t be patient with him any longer, so he forces himself into the bathroom. He puts the toilet seat down, hesitates, then pulls down his boxers and spins around to sit down quickly. It feels weird, peeing sitting down, and the sound it makes is different, which is strange, and not something he’d ever considered before. He wipes quickly, flushing and washing his hands and getting out of there as quick as he can.

After a couple more hours of listless drama-watching, his phone finally informs him that it’s getting later and that the others will start getting home in an hour or so. _Thank God._ He doesn’t really think that they’ll have come up with any solution, and he doesn’t exactly enjoy all the staring and gawking when the other members are around, but at this point anything’s better than just lying around trying not to think. 

He’ll have to change back into the torturous clothes again, though; he didn’t miss how uncomfortable Sunggyu looked when he didn’t have a bra on, and he hadn’t been a fan of the way the other guys stared at his body, even if Woohyun and Sungjong, at least, tried to pretend they weren’t looking. He can’t really blame them for staring: everyone knows he likes to look at a pretty girl more than anyone else, and when that pretty girl is their bandmate who used to be a guy, of course they’re going to stare. That doesn’t mean he has to like it, though.

He’s about to try to get the bra on again (and he’s not looking forward to that at _all_ ) when he remembers that he didn’t shower last night. Or this morning. He groans; he needs a wash, and he should really do it now while the other guys are all gone. Somehow it’ll feel less awkward if he knows he’s alone in the dorm.

He’s out of shampoo, though, and so is Dongwoo, and Myungsoo’s been using this kind that has a scent that makes him gag, so he decides to use the bathroom the other four guys use—Sungjong spends a lot of money on some fancy shampoo, and surely he won’t mind if Sungyeol uses it just this once—don’t girls have to take good care of their hair?

The hot water feels good against his skin, just like it always does, but his hair gets so heavy so quickly, clinging to his back and shoulders. He shakes it back out of his face as best he can, just standing there for a while and taking in the warmth and pressure of the water pounding against his body; it’s the most like himself he’s felt since he woke up this morning, feeling a little strange, and then climbed out of bed and looked in the mirror and nearly had a heart attack. 

He washes his hair first, and it’s not all that different from normal hair-washing except that there’s so much more of it. He uses a lot of Woohyun’s conditioner, and it takes _so long_ for him to feel like he’s gotten all of it out once he rinses. No wonder girls take such long showers. 

And then it’s time to wash his body, the one he’s been purposefully not looking at up until now. If you leave out the major differences—no dick, new boobs—it’s actually not all that different, just curvier with wider hips and a smaller waist. His stomach and ass, at least are almost exactly the same, which is strangely comforting. He plays with his boobs a bit more as he cleans them because they’re so fascinating—they feel different than any other part of the body, soft and firm and pliant all at the same time. He avoids his nipples, though, because he’s just not prepared to deal with that now, and then it’s time to clean—down there. 

The hair’s not all that different, just a little softer, but the lack of his dick and balls hanging there is. The opening surrounded by protective lips is something he’s never felt before, having never made it that far with any of the girls he’s been with. But after a moment he remembers from anatomy class that there are two openings—one for peeing, one for sex (or babies, actually, the text had said, but he absolutely definitely isn’t going to think about that at all). He explores a bit, sliding his fingers between skin and hair, feeling half-guilty as he does, but too intrigued to stop and then—

_Oh_. 

He slips, almost falling down at the sudden jolt of sensation. What the fuck was—that must be—he finds the little bead again, rubbing it and once again taken aback by the bolt of pleasure it sends through him. No wonder girls are so adamant about guys finding the clit. It’s—wow. 

He (really) wants to explore it some more, but it feels dirty in a way that jerking off never has, and then there’s the whole fact that he _isn’t supposed to have one of those_ and just thinking of getting himself off as a girl is a little too much for him to handle at the moment, so he quickly rinses off and climbs out of the shower.

He finds a comb and wrestles it through his hair for a while—there’s so _much_ of it—before rubbing it down with a towel and brushing his teeth. Then he pauses, wiping the steam off the mirror and jerking back at the sight of his reflection. It’s so _weird_ , how much it does and doesn’t look like him.

Taking a deep breath, he takes a step back and drops his towel.

 

 

When Woohyun gets back from his schedule, he’s tired and achy and really just wants a shower. It’s not that his schedule was so very strenuous today, because it wasn’t, but every spare moment he didn’t have to pay attention was spent going over and over Sungyeol’s problem in his head, trying to figure out what could have possibly caused this, trying not to think about what it was doing to Sungyeol’s head (or what Sungyeol looks like in that body). As he’s discovered since becoming an idol, Woohyun tends to get more exhausted from emotional stress than from physical exhaustion, so he’s feeling wrung out when he walks in the door. Sungyeol isn’t in front of the TV where he expected to find him, but it’s still on and the empty snack packages strewn about say he was here not long ago. The door to his bedroom is closed, so Woohyun figures he must be taking a nap or a shower or something. He knows he should go check on Sungyeol right away, but he just doesn’t feel like he’ll be up for it until he at least gets a shower, so he pulls of his shirt and heads to the bathroom, throwing the door open.

And freezes.

Because Sungyeol is standing naked in the middle of the room, studying himself in the mirror, and because of the reflection, Woohyun can see every inch of him, both front and back, and he’s mesmerized.

So much white skin, that’s the first thing he notices, so pale and so soft-looking, all over. Damp black hair, silky and long, is clinging to his back as it curves down into an adorably small ass that’s not all that different than the ass Sungyeol has in his own body. Actually, the surprising thing about this body is how much it resembles Sungyeol’s normal one: lanky and leanly muscled except for the gentle curve of his belly. But he has hips now, where he never had them before, and then there are those tits, and okay: maybe they are a little on the small side, but they’re _perfect_ , and between Sungyeol’s legs is a v of dark hair and _fuck_ , Woohyun has never seen anything so hot in all his life as the body Sungyeol is currently wearing.

All of this Woohyun takes in in an instant. Because then Sungyeol is shrieking and dropping down into a crouch, his arms crossed over his chest and his hair swinging around him, and Woohyun flushes so red he thinks that every drop of blood in his body has made its way to his cheeks—or he would think that, if he didn’t have such absolute proof that quite a lot of it has headed in another direction altogether. 

“Sor—sorry!” Woohyun stutters, jerking backwards and trying to get out the door. 

“Woohyun, get _out_!” Sungyeol shrieks, and he’s never sounded more feminine. 

Woohyun slams the door behind him as quickly as he can, reaching out to the wall to keep himself upright, trying to calm his heart and beat back his guilt. It isn’t the first time he’s seen Sungyeol naked, of course, and worse: it isn’t the first time he’s gotten hard at the sight of Sungyeol’s body. But as he pulls himself off the wall and races into the other bathroom, locking the door and tearing his clothes off before hurling himself into the shower and cranking the water as hot as it will go, he’s never felt so guilty as he does now, jerking himself to one of the best orgasms he’s ever had, totally immersed in the thought of all that white, soft skin and Sungyeol’s voice calling his name. In the haze of his shame-tinged pleasure, he doesn’t know if that voice is high or low; all he knows is that it cracks in that familiar way, the way that only Sungyeol’s does.


	2. Chapter 2

When Woohyun finally convinces himself to leave the bathroom, Sungyeol is sitting in the living room, legs curled up in one of those contorting positions that only the unreasonably long-limbed can manage. His damp hair is pulled back in a low ponytail, and he’s wearing the skirt from earlier and a shirt Woohyun recognizes as one of Sungyeol’s own; it’s too big, revealing more of Sungyeol’s shoulders and collarbones (not to mention his bra straps) than Woohyun is entirely comfortable with, but he understands why Sungyeol wants to wear his own clothes, so he doesn’t mention the fact that it really doesn’t go with the skirt at all. Instead he just sits down quietly beside Sungyeol, glancing at him out of the corner of his eye as Sungyeol keeps his eyes trained on the TV. He’s pulled the end of his ponytail around and is painting his lips with the tip of it, arms pulled in tight like he’s trying to make himself as small as possible. It makes Woohyun feel sick.

“I’m sorry,” he says, and Sungyeol’s eyes flicker to him for only the briefest of moments before focusing back on the TV again. “I didn’t—I didn’t know you were in there, I’d have thought you’d be in the other bathroom or I’d have knocked—I’m sorry.”

One of those white shoulders with the yellow strap rises up till its touching Sungyeol’s cheek. “You didn’t get your ass out very fast,” he says, tugging on the end of his hair.

“I know. I was—surprised.” _And I couldn’t take my eyes off of you._ “I was just really shocked, Yeol.”

“Yeah,” Sungyeol laughs shortly. “Probably about as shocked as I was when I woke up in this body.”

“Probably not quite,” Woohyun says, because he can’t think of anything else to say, and they sit a while in silence while something neither of them is particularly paying attention to plays on the television.

“Your day—was it okay?” Woohyun asks suddenly, and this time Sungyeol actually looks at him, eyes narrow.

“It was boring as hell. I used to lay around and do nothing all the time and I loved it. But now I get bored after an hour. Being an idol has ruined me.”

Woohyun laughs at that, more in relief that Sungyeol can still be wry than anything else. “I probably wouldn’t know what to do with myself either. Except sleep, maybe. A whole day of sleep? That would be nice.”

“I was too keyed-up to sleep.”

Woohyun’s laughter fades. “Yeah, I bet. And—and no…change or anything?”

The look Sungyeol gives him is unimpressed. “I still don’t have a dick, if that’s what you’re asking. But then you saw that yourself.”

Woohyun isn’t one to blush very often, but he does it now. “Sungyeol—“

“Got a nice long look, didn’t you?” Sungyeol says, and he sounds bitter, and it just makes Woohyun feel worse, but for God’s sake, what does Sungyeol expect? 

“Like you wouldn’t stare at a hot naked girl if you had the chance!” he protests.

“I’m not a hot girl! I’m not a girl at all!”

“Well, your body is right now! Excuse me for looking!”

The look Sungyeol gives him is scathing. “Let’s see you turn into a girl and me stare at you and we’ll see how you like it.”

Woohyun winces. “I said I was sorry!”

“Yeah, well, that doesn’t make me feel any better, does it?”

They lapse into silence again after Sungyeol’s snappish reply, and again they stare at the TV without seeing it until Woohyun speaks again. “Look, are you okay, Yeol?” He can’t stop the question, because it really seems like the only one that matters.

“Of course I’m not okay, you idiot,” Sungyeol snaps scornfully. “I’m a _girl_.”

“I know! I know you’re all turned upside down and I don’t blame you at all—no one could—of course you’re totally freaking out—but—“ He can’t think of what he wants to say, can’t find the words for it, so he stops, tilting his head at Sungyeol helplessly. He needs to _know_ , to know this isn’t killing Sungyeol because that thought just isn’t something Woohyun is strong enough to deal with. He needs to know that Sungyeol will be okay, maybe more than he’s ever needed anything in his life.

Sungyeol glares at him fiercely for a moment, then sighs, defeated. “This is a nightmare. Like, literally: I think I’ve had nightmares about this before. I don’t know why it’s happening or when it will be over or _if_ it will be over, and everyone around me is freaking out, and there’s nothing I can do, and I just want to crawl right out of this body, okay? I want to be—not in this body. Anywhere but in it. I don’t—“

“Hey.” Woohyun has his arm around Sungyeol before he even thinks about it, trying to pull him close, but Sungyeol shoves him away.

“Stop comforting me like a girl!” Sungyeol shouts, swiping angrily at the tears on his face. “I’m not a girl! Even like this—I’m not a girl! I’m not!”

“Okay!” Woohyun does not want to point out that he would want to put his arm around a crying Sungyeol even if he was in his male body; Sungyeol would think he was lying anyways. “Sorry—sorry.” He thrashes around in his mind for something he can say, anything he can say to make this better, but there isn’t anything, so he resorts to his old standby when it comes to interacting with Sungyeol: humor. “Hey—think about it like this. It could be worse.”

“How could it possibly be worse, dumbass?” Sungyeol demands, wiping away the last of the tears from his cheeks.

“At least you’re pretty. You could have turned into an ugly girl.”

Sungyeol rolls his eyes and shoves him, and this would be the time where Woohyun would shove him back, laughing, and they’d end up wrestling around on the floor. But even though he knows part of Sungyeol wants him to treat him just exactly like he does in his real body, he’s also aware enough to realize that the rest of Sungyeol doesn’t want to be touched when he’s like this. 

So he sticks to words. “I know you’ve seen the video of that time they got me all dressed up like a girl and made me sing on that variety show,” he points out, still grinning. “And you saw how I looked in a lady’s hanbok. Trust me when I say: you make a much prettier girl than I would.”

“Anyone would make a prettier girl than you would,” Sungyeol says.

“Not anyone!” Woohyun protests. “Myungsoo is the ugliest girl ever.”

Sungyeol is starting to smile now. “Well, that’s true.”

“And can you imagine Hoya and Gyu-hyung in drag? Hoya would look like an ajumma—like somebody's old, ugly grandma. And Sunggyu would look like a hamster stuffed into a dress!” 

Sungyeol is laughing outright now, his familiar breathy laugh. “We should see if we can get a hold of a wig and sneak into their rooms one night and take pictures!”

Woohyun grins at him. “They would kill us. Painfully.”

“But it would be so, so worth it,” Sungyeol counters.

“Don’t think I won’t sell you out, because I absolutely will blame everything on you—and don’t expect me to cry over your cold, dead body.”

“Whatever. You’d sob your eyes out, you giant crybaby.”

“I do not cry that much! Why does everyone act like I cry all the time?” Woohyun protests.

“Because you cry almost as much as Dongwoo-hyung.”

“Only for the Inspirits! They like it when we cry!"

"Oh, don't even start up with the greasiness now—I'm your only audience and it won't win me over at all. In fact, it makes me want to throw up."

"See if I help you with your little prank now, dumbass."

“I'll do it myself—don’t think I won’t!” 

“Oh, I have no doubt that you will.” Woohyun is grinning wide by now, but the smile fades as the humor drains from Sungyeol's eyes. That moment of normalcy hadn't been nearly long enough.

“What do you want for dinner, then?” he asks, trying to keep his tone as casual as possible as he rises to his feet.

“Donkkaseu?” Sungyeol suggests, lifting hopeful eyes to Woohyun, and _fuck_ , he’s really ridiculously pretty like this, the prettiest girl Woohyun has ever seen.

Woohyun turns his back quickly. “Donkkaseu it is, then.”

The kitchen doesn’t seem far enough away from Sungyeol’s tempting prettiness, not far enough away from the surrealness of this situation, but chopping and stirring and frying is soothing, grounding him a bit more in this moment. He’s still hoping this will turn out to be a dream, but he knows it’s all too vivid, too detailed and lifelike for that. No, this is real, and they’re just going to have to deal with it.

The other guys start trickling in one by one, and Woohyun hears them greet Sungyeol and ask how he is. Sungyeol’s answers become more impatient and sarcastic with each inquiry, and finally he startles Woohyun by stomping into the kitchen, walking over to the far corner and squeezing himself into the space between the fridge and the wall. 

“Be my bodyguard,” he demands, sitting and wrapping his arms around his drawn-up knees. Woohyun pauses in his cooking, staring at him.

“Yeol, what the hell are you doing? Are you turning into an animal or something now? Is this some new transformation?”

“They’re driving me crazy!” Sungyeol says, yanking on the end of his ponytail. “Hoya keeps asking me these disgusting questions and Myungsoo won’t quit staring and—“

“Stay here,” Woohyun interrupts, gripping the knife in his hand too hard. “Just stay right there, okay?”

“I am,” Sungyeol agrees petulantly. Woohyun goes back to cooking, attacking the chopping with more enthusiasm than is strictly necessary. Dongwoo bounces up after a few minutes, looking eager, “Hey, Yeollie, do you want to dance with me? I never get to dance with a girl—it'll be fun!”

“Out!” Woohyun orders before Sungyeol has to reply, brandishing his knife in Dongwoo’s direction. “If you want dinner, you’ll stay out of my kitchen. I need to concentrate without you getting underfoot.”

“But Sungyeol is in here!” Dongwoo protests, pointing as though Woohyun hadn’t noticed Sungyeol’s very conspicuous presence.

“He’s not bothering me because he’s being quiet for once, and he’s sitting still, which you aren’t even capable of doing. Go get hyung to play with you or something.” Woohyun is never impatient like this with Dongwoo, not ever, but he'd seen the look in Sungyeol's eyes at the suggestion and right now he knows he just needs to get Dongwoo away before Sungyeol explodes.

Dongwoo doesn't take it too badly, anyway, just wandering off, but he’s barely been gone a minute before Myungsoo appears in the doorway. He doesn’t even have time to open his mouth before Woohyun levels the knife at him. “Out, Kim. Go bother someone else.”

Myungsoo gives him a nasty look, then throws a longing one at Sungyeol, but when Sungyeol refuses to look at him, he obeys, disappearing again as silently as he came. Woohyun rolls his eyes and turns back to his cooking. 

“You’re a good bodyguard,” Sungyeol says, resting his chin on his knees. With his legs pulled up like that, Woohyun can see more than a peek of his pink-striped underwear, and he kind of wants to beg Sungyeol to sit in a more ladylike position, but he doesn’t want to upset him more, so he just turns his back and focuses on breathing in time with his chopping. 

“I expect to be well-paid,” he says, trying to keep his voice light. “You’re treating me for the rest of our lives, right?”

“You’re the stingiest person I know,” Sungyeol answers. “When have you ever treated me?”

“I have!” Woohyun protests. “That time with the chicken and the—“

“One time,” Sungyeol points out, sounding unimpressed. “And chicken. You should treat me to beef sometime, you cheap bastard.”

Woohyun opens his mouth to make a joke about that sounding like a date, but he swallows it in time; the last things Sungyeol needs right now is jokes about dating his bandmates. “Well, maybe I will,” he says instead, lamely.

Sungyeol snorts. It’s unladylike, maybe, but pretty cute. “I’ll believe it when I see it.”

“You have no faith in me, do you?” Woohyun pouts.

“None whatsoever, especially not when it comes to money and especially not when you make ridiculous faces like that. You look disgusting, you ought to be ashamed of yourself.”

They talk about nothing like that for a while, and with Woohyun’s back to him like this, it’s easy to forget that there’s anything abnormal about Sungyeol. Sure, his voice is higher than normal, but the inflection, the word choice, everything else is just exactly like Sungyeol’s. _Because it_ is _Sungyeol, pabo,_ Woohyun reminds himself. _It’s only his body that’s changed._

Sungyeol rises reluctantly when Woohyun announces that dinner’s done, but when Woohyun hands him some dishes to carry out to the living room and he gets a good whiff of them, he perks up a bit. Everyone gathers around to inhale the food, and it’s almost like a normal meal. Almost.

“Stop that!” Sungyeol yelps, slapping Dongwoo’s hand away as Dongwoo tries to bring his chopsticks up to Sungyeol’s mouth to feed him. “I’m not an infant, I can feed myself!” He glares at Sunggyu next. “And stop giving me the best pieces, you never do that.”

“I’m just trying to be polite,” Sunggyu says, sounding almost petulant, which is _not_ an attractive look on him, Woohyun notes. 

“Since when are you polite to me? You’re never polite to me! Stop being so weird!” He picks up his crumpled napkin and hurls it at Myungsoo’s face. “And stop staring at me, you creeper!”

“He stares at you anyway,” Hoya points out, but that doesn’t calm Sungyeol.

“Yeah, well, it’s different now, and I don’t like it! And why are you looking at me like that?” he shoots at Sungjong.

Sungjong just tilts his head to the side. “You've got the body of a runway model--I could dress you in anything and you'd pull it off. I should call Luna tomorrow and—“

Sungyeol makes a strangled angry noise and jumps to his feet, the skirt flaring out around his legs in an appealing way, and stomps off into his room, slamming the door behind him. 

“Well,” Hoya says, taking a bite of cabbage. “I guess that answers the question of whether he’ll PMS or not.”

“You all are being ridiculously annoying,” Woohyun argues, glancing at the door. “He just wants you to treat him like you always do. You all acting like he’s some kind of princess makes this so much worse for him. Of course he’s mad at you, dumbass. It’s got nothing to do with PMS.” Probably.

“He is a princess,” Hoya shrugs. “Hey, Sungjong, that reminds me, I’ve been meaning to ask you—how do you feel about not being the pretty one anymore?”

Sungjong’s eyes narrow, but he coolly takes a bite of rice. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, sure you do,” Hoya teases, nudging him with his elbow. “You’re trying to be all manly now and everything, but I know you secretly hate the fact that another member is prettier than you know. It’s killing you inside, isn’t it?”

“It really isn’t,” Sungjong says, calm even if his eyes are glinting. “Because he’s not prettier than me.”

“Uh, Sungjongie, I hate to break it to you, but he kind of is now,” Dongwoo says, scratching his head. 

Sungjong’s lips go thin. “No. He isn’t.”

“He is,” Myungsoo offers suddenly, and Woohyun holds his breath. If this were a year ago, they’d have a temper tantrum on their hands, Woohyun knows, Sungjong absolutely refusing to accept the idea that anyone is prettier than him. But this is now, and Sungjong just gives them all the most evil look Woohyun could possibly imagine. “Keep saying that all you want. Just remember that I know where you all sleep.”

That would be a joke coming from anyone else, but from Sungjong it’s actually terrifying. Woohyun doesn’t care, though, because _he_ hadn’t insulted Sungjong and besides, the other guys kind of deserve it. So he just grabs Sungyeol’s abandoned bowl and chopsticks and goes to knock on the bedroom door.

“Go away!”

“I brought you your food, you ungrateful baby,” Woohyun says, leaning against the door. There’s silence after that, so he takes it that Sungyeol isn’t undressed or anything (he shudders as the thought) and pushes the door open, closing it quietly behind him.

Sungyeol is laying on his side on his bed with his hand tucked between his knees like he often does, staring at nothing. He doesn’t move when Woohyun comes in, but his eyes follow his movements. Even after just a few minutes apart, it’s still jarring to see him like this, to be abruptly reminded of the change. Woohyun swallows.

“I want to be alone.”

Woohyun sets the bowl and chopsticks on the bed close to Sungyeol’s head. “You should eat this, though, before it gets cold, so you don’t have to come complaining in two hours that you’re hungry and won’t I make you something. I have made you something, and here it, so you better eat it.”

Sungyeol looks away. “I don’t like the—the _coddling_ any better coming from you,” he pouts. 

“I’m not coddling you. I just worked damn hard on this meal and I don’t want to see it go to waste.” 

That’s not why he’s here and they both know it, but after a moment Sungyeol sits up and picks up the bowl. Woohyun finds that he’s staring at Sungyeol’s mouth as he eats, so turns away, leaning back against the bedstead and sighing into the quiet.

Sungyeol finishes quickly—he was always a quick eater—and then shoves the bowl in Woohyun’s direction. “I want to be alone now,” he announces.

“You sure?” Woohyun asks. “Because I know you were bored today without us and—“

“I want to be alone,” Sungyeol repeats, and Woohyun takes the bowl. He pauses at the door. “If you need anything else, just—“

“No. Coddling!”

Woohyun grins. “Fine, then. I’ll just make sure not to make your favorite dishes anymore—I wouldn’t want to be accused of coddling—“ He doesn’t get to finish the sentence because a pillow slams into his face, and he’s chuckling as he goes out into the living room.

The others are finished eating, too, and Hoya and Sungjong are washing dishes in the kitchen, so Woohyun leaves the bowl with them and seeks Sunggyu out in their room.

“I think maybe we should let Sungyeol have our room tonight and one of us take his bed and the other sleep on the couch,” he announces, climbing onto Sunggyu’s bed beside him. 

Sunggyu looks up from his laptop and raises an eyebrow. “Really? You don’t think that would seem like special treatment? He’s pretty touchy about that right now—remind me to talk to the kids about it.”

_And who could blame him?_ “We could offer, at least. Let him decide. It just might be easier if he has some privacy, you know. Besides,” he adds, mouth screwing up with the words, “I’m half convinced Myungsoo will jump him in his sleep.”

Sunggyu rolls his eyes. “He wouldn’t actually do that, Woohyun.”

“He sleepwalks,” Woohyun points out. “I’m just saying, I wouldn’t be surprised if we wake up to Sungyeol screaming bloody murder about how Myungsoo has climbed in the bed with him.”

Sunggyu shakes his head, clearly unconvinced by Woohyun’s imaginings. “You're insane, but we’ll offer anyway.”

Good, then. That's taken care of. “What are you looking up?” Woohyun asks, nodding toward the computer screen.

Sunggyu sighs in frustration. “I’m trying to find any information about what could have happened to Sungyeol. But everything I’m finding is either gender reassignment surgery information or fanfiction.” He winces a bit at the last word and Woohyun grimaces along with him; they know the stuff exists, stuff about them, even, but they try not to think about it.

“Nothing useful at all?”

“Nothing,” Sunggyu confirms. “Unless he’s stuck like this and he decides he wants to try the surgery—“

Woohyun shoves him, hard. “Don’t even talk like that—how can you say that?” How could he even consider something like that? Sungyeol is _going_ to get his body back. He is.

Sunggyu looks pained but stubborn. “I’m just trying to be realistic. We don’t know what’s causing this, so we don’t know how to fix it and at some point someone’s going to have to think about how Sungyeol will have to deal with this.”

“But not at this point,” Woohyun insists, feeling panic rise inside him like a geyser and trying desperately to fight it back. “Not so early. Let’s just…not go there now, okay?”

Sunggyu sighs again, closing the laptop. “Fine. You’re right, probably. I’m just—I don’t like feeling like this. I’m his leader and his hyung, I’m supposed to take care of him, but there’s nothing I can _do_.” He closes his eyes, massaging his eyelids with the heels of his hands. “I just feel so useless.”

Woohyun’s heart aches, and he feels so so old and so so tired as he lays back on the bed, running a hand over his face. “Me, too. I feel like shit. But then I keep reminding myself—if I feel like this, how must Sungyeol feel?”

Sunggyu doesn’t say anything, both of them brooding in silence for a while until Woohyun can’t hold his biggest fear in any longer. “Hyung,” he says softly. “What if this is the one thing the seven of us can’t fix together? If he stays like this—“ he almost chokes on the words “—they’ll take him away and he’ll have to deal with it alone, and they’ll probably have to hide him away somewhere or something, and won’t that kill him?” He knows all his fear is coming through in his words, and he usually tries not to let that show, but this is Sunggyu, and he trusts him more than anyone, and he trusts that Sunggyu won’t think less of him if he breaks down every once in a while—as long as he’s breaking down over Infinite. And Sungyeol is Infinite—part of it, at least—and if ever there was a reason to break down, this is it. “What will we _do_ , hyung?” he pleads, and Woohyun doesn’t plead. He cajoles, he greases, he even nags and demands, but he never pleads. Now, though, he thinks might just be the time for pleading. “What will _he_ do?”

Woohyun stares up at the bottom of his bunk, his eyes blurring a little with tears he hasn’t allowed himself to indulge in thus far. After a moment he feels Sunggyu crawling over to him, stretching out beside him and throwing an arm around his waist. Away from the cameras, the two of them are rarely touchy, never cuddly, not with each other, but right now Woohyun is thankful for the warmth of his hyung against him.

“I don’t know, Woohyunnie,” Sunggyu murmurs, and Sunggyu doesn’t _say_ that, he _always_ tries to phrase things so that he doesn’t have to admit that something might be beyond him. That—hearing him admit that this is beyond him—scares Woohyun more than anything, and he lays there and lets a few tears slip down his temples as he imagines Sungyeol far away from them, trying to deal with this on his own. Sunggyu’s arm tightens around him.

“But,” Sunggyu continues after a moment, “I promise I will try my hardest to keep them from taking him away from you.”

Woohyun shoots upright so fast he almost smacks his head on the bottom of the bed, cheeks burning for what seems like the dozenth time today. “That’s not what I mea—“

“Yes, it is,” Sunggyu interrupts, sitting up to face him. He gives Woohyun a knowing little smile. “You think I haven’t noticed?”

“Hyung!” Woohyun shouts, his volume heightened by his humiliation. _Am I that obvious?_

“I can’t say I see the appeal—or I didn’t till this morning, anyway, but—“

“Hyung!” Woohyun interrupts, horrified. “Stop _saying_ things like that! Have you lost your _mind_?” _Fuck._ Woohyun had thought he’d guarded his secret pretty well, especially considering that he still hasn’t quite come to terms with it himself. He’s been trying to avoid thinking about it, honestly, what Sungyeol makes him feel, but right now he feels like the universe is conspiring to ensure that he’ll have to face it. _Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck._

“I mean, it feels like just yesterday he was calling you a buzzkill and hating your greasiness, and now I guess you two have become good friends and just when that happened I failed to notice, but I just really don’t know why you’d be interested in him—he’s rebellious and disobedient and weak and he doesn’t take anything seriously—“

“That’s not even true!” Woohyun interrupts. He isn’t going to listen to anyone say that shit about Sungyeol, especially not now, not when he can still see the look of misery on his face as he laid there on his bed. “He just thinks honesty is really important and he’s not going to pretend to care about something if he doesn’t.”

“Ah,” Sunggyu says, nodding like something just became clear to him. “That’s it, then. You’re surrounded by idols, everyone being fake all the time, so of course you’re drawn to—“

“Hyung! Stop psychoanalyzing me or I'll kick your ass, I don't even care that you're my leader! What is your _problem_?”

“Okay, okay,” Sunggyu says, taking mercy on him. “I’m just saying: I see how you are with him lately, and I know it would tear you up if they sent him away, that’s all.” Woohyun looks away, inwardly cursing, but Sunggyu continues. “I don’t know if he feels the same way—I can never figure out what he’s thinking, thank God—but either way, I want the seven of us to stay together no matter what.”

“Hyung, we are never, ever talking about this again,” Woohyun says, adament. “Never."

Sunggyu laughs. “Yeah, okay, sure. Want to go ask Sungyeol if he wants to trade rooms now?”

“What? Now?” _How could I possibly even look at him after that conversation?_

Sunggyu is still laughing. “I’m just kidding. I’ll do it myself.”

“Jackass,” Woohyun mutters under his breath as Sunggyu heads for the door.

“I heard that,” Sunggyu tosses over his shoulder before disappearing, and Woohyun lets out an explosive sigh of frustration and throws himself back on the bed. He'll have to get up in a minute, get his stuff for the night and get out of Sungyeol's way without spontaneously combusting in embarrassment when he sees him. But for right now, Woohyun closes his eyes and does something he's almost never done in his life, only a few times before when he was a trainee and wasn't quite sure he'd ever debut. He prays.


	3. Chapter 3

The first thing Sungyeol does when he wakes up is stick his hand down his pants. And then withdraws it with a groan, because, no: still no dick. He punches his pillow a few times, feeling like Sungjong beating up his stuffed animal but not caring about the show of immaturity. It’s not like there’s anyone to see, and if anyone ever deserved to take out his rage on an inanimate object, it’s surely Sungyeol. The punching doesn’t make him feel much better, so he buries his face in the pillow and screams for a while, and that does. Normally he’d at least hesitate before committing such violence on his vocal chords—their vocal coaches would want to kill him even more than they usually do if they found out—but it’s not like he’s going to be singing when he’s in this body. At least that’s something.

There’s really no reason for him to be up—he’s not going to be leaving the dorm again today, obviously—but he’s awake now, so he climbs down out of Woohyun’s bed and starts sorting through the clothes Eunji left him. He’d chosen Woohyun’s bed instead of Sunggyu’s because it just felt way too weird to share something like that with Sunggyu; Woohyun, at least, is his good friend. The bed had smelled way too much like Woohyun—not a smell he hates or anything (actually, it smells really good), but still—but he at least had his own pillow and some space of his own. At first he’d been indignant when Sunggyu offered the room; he’d been ready to throw a tantrum before he realized that he really, really did want some privacy. It’s not that he’s scared of Myungsoo and Dongwoo or anything (he knows Woohyun keeps thinking Myungsoo is going to jump him, but Sungyeol knows he wouldn’t do that), it’s just that everything feels so uncomfortable when they’re looking at him, and being able to close the door on their stares—Dongwoo’s way too curious, Myungsoo’s way too intense—was a big relief. It was nice of Woohyun to think of it (because of course it was Woohyun; he’s surprisingly sensitive and generous when he wants to be). 

Sungyeol has just managed to strap himself into the bra-from-hell and pulled on another skirt— _I sent you all our longest skirts because I know your legs are so long! =_=_ Eunji’s note had read, and he’d been pathetically grateful that she’d understood without him having to tell her that he wanted to cover up as much as possible—and one of his t-shirts (not a v-neck: that exposes too much even if he doesn’t have much cleavage to show), when there’s a quiet knock at the door.

“Hey,” Woohyun says when Sungyeol opens it.

“Hey,” Sungyeol answers, eyeing him suspiciously. Woohyun had been weird last night when he gave the room over to Sungyeol, refusing to look at him and hurrying to get away as fast as possible. It had made Sungyeol feel even worse, because Woohyun has been the only one who’s really been halfway decent at not making him feel like a freak. There hadn’t been any explanation for it, either; Sungyeol had been wearing the clothes from earlier, hadn’t even changed into his pajamas yet. Jackass.

“Uh, I forgot socks, so….”

Sungyeol rolls his eyes and throws the door open all the way, letting Woohyun in. “For such a greasy guy, you’re a really bad liar. You just wanted to see if I’d woken up as myself again.”

“I really did forget socks, too!” Woohyun protests, pulling a pair out of his drawer. He turns around to look at Sungyeol again. “But no change.” He shakes his head. “At least you didn’t wake up as a parakeet or something. I had a dream you turned into a baby.”

“What the fuck, Woohyun?”

Woohyun grins. “I’m serious! You toddled around and cooed and played with Dongwoo and we made Sungjong change all your dirty diapers. You had the most adorable chubby cheeks and you screamed your lungs out when you didn’t get your way. You really weren’t all that different than you usually are, actually, except for the diapers thing.”

Sungyeol glares at him furiously. “You have the most twisted mind of anyone I’ve ever met and if you keep talking I’m going to kill you.”

“At least you were a boy baby! You had the cutest little—“

“Do you want me to beat the shit out of you?” Sungyeol shrieks, and he really is considering punching that laughter right off of Woohyun’s face, except that he probably wouldn’t even leave a bruise. He scowls down at his toothpick arms. 

“Okay, okay,” Woohyun says, laughter dying down. “Let’s get some breakfast, okay?”

Everyone’s first thought when they wake up seems to be to rush out and see if Sungyeol is still a girl, and the crestfallen looks on all of their faces when they see that Sungyeol isn’t back to himself makes Sungyeol feel simultaneously much worse and much better. Worse for the obvious reasons, but better because at least he knows they actually care enough to want him to be himself again. Some of them seem to be taking a little too much pleasure in his current condition. 

Another check in with the manager-hyungs, who of course don’t have any solution to his problem, and another admonition to _stay in the dorm_ under all circumstances. Sungyeol is half convinced that even if the building catches on fire they’d rather him stay inside and allow himself to be burnt to a crisp than to risk anyone seeing a girl come out of Infinite’s dorm if he tries to save himself. Fuckers. 

The others all leave for their various schedules—and Sungyeol never thought he’d be jealous, but he really is—but Woohyun, once again, hangs back. 

His face is way too serious as he looks up at Sungyeol—Sungyeol still has an inch or so on him, and he needs to remember to gloat about that at some point: that even as a girl he’s taller than Woohyun—and it makes Sungyeol feel squirmy and pissed-off all at once. “I know you hate this, I know. But is there anything I can do? Anything at all?”

Sungyeol clings to the pissed-off-ness; it’s easier to deal with. “Other than get me my dick back, you mean? Of course there’s nothing you can do, dumbass. Now get the hell out of here before the hyungs yell at you.”

Woohyun hesitates for just a moment more, but Sungyeol glares at him so fiercely that he finally sighs and leaves. And leaves Sungyeol alone.

This day isn’t any less boring than the day before. He makes and drinks a lot of coffee, inhales a lot of snacks, lolls around on the floor in front of the TV, watches stupid videos on the internet, stalks his high school friends on facebook, snoops through all the other guys’ stuff (and doesn’t find anything incriminating by the way, or at least nothing he didn’t already know about). He’d typically spend a while adding to his porn collection and jerking off, but there’s no way he’s going to do that in this body. Finally he gets so bored that he decides to practice the latest choreo. Sunggyu would be proud—not that that’s why Sungyeol is doing it; he hasn’t ever done anything with the intent to make Sunggyu proud and isn’t going to start now. But he might as well at least make some actual use of all this dead time, he thinks, shoving all the members’ junk to the sides of the living room so he has some open space to move in. 

But the thing is—it doesn’t work. No matter how hard he tries, he’s always…off. This body is totally capable of doing each of the moves he discovers when he turns the music off and does each of them one by one. But when he tries to do them quickly, stringing them together to the music, he ends up stumbling, almost falling over, unable to swing from one move to the next in time without having to compensate. 

At first he thinks it might possibly be because he’s not as used to the new choreography yet, but when he puts on “Paradise” and “Come Back Again,” he’s just as incapable of doing the dances without looking like a fool—or more of one, anyway (and there’s no way in hell he’s even going to _try_ to do the Scorpion Dance when he’s like this—the last thing he needs at the moment is more failure). It’s so incredibly frustrating that he screams into a pillow again—Sunggyu’s this time, because he’s all sweaty and gross and doesn’t want to get his own pillow dirty, but he’s still mad at Sunggyu for being so polite to him, so the bastard deserves it—and then punches it some more. It’s only after he calms down that he really stops to think about how his body is different now and remembers things like different centers of gravity and muscle groups. He could teach this body to do the dances, maybe even better than his real one, but he’d have to start from scratch, learning them from the beginning. At that thought, he comes closer to crying than he has since the beginning. And maybe—just maybe—when he takes a shower, a few tears fall down, but they mix with the water, so he can ignore them.

The day after that is much like the two that came before: he’s plagued by mind-numbing boredom punctuated by frustration when he’s alone, but he’s not much happier when the other members are at home. He lays in bed and night and pictures strangling them, but then he remembers that he wouldn’t be able to take any of them down, not even Sungjong, so he shifts his plans to poison instead. They’re just all so hard to deal with like this: Myungsoo stares (he’s noticed it’s bothering Sungyeol and so he tries not to make it obvious, but Myungsoo is a really bad actor and worse at being sneaky), Dongwoo touches (he doesn’t even seem to know he’s doing it until Sungyeol jerks away from him, and then he’s really apologetic so Sungyeol feels guilty even being upset about it), Sungjong glares (Sungyeol is pretty sure he’s heard him muttering under his breath about how there’s no way Sungyeol is prettier than him), Hoya makes disgusting jokes (and Sungyeol swears that he won’t ever laugh at one of Hoya’s comments about girls again, no matter how funny they are at the time), and Sunggyu is more polite than he’s ever been to Sungyeol (which is unnerving and infuriating and he tries to annoy the leader to the point of snapping a few times, but even then Sunggyu won’t yell at him. Sungyeol hates it). Woohyun sometimes suddenly turns awkward and looks away, but he’s trying, at least, making a real effort to treat him like he always does, and that’s something. He’s the only one Sungyeol can stand to be around for more than five minutes at a time, and even though they’ve been close for a while now, he wouldn’t have ever guessed that Woohyun would be the only one he’d feel comfortable being with. But he is.

So when he reaches his snapping point on the third day of his quarantine, it’s Woohyun he corners. Woohyun’s eyes widen as he sees Sungyeol barreling down on him, but he lets Sungyeol drag him into the bedroom—and yes, Sungyeol is more than aware that he is indeed _letting_ him, since he’s pretty sure Woohyun could snap one of his wrists without even breaking a sweat, but he shoves that thought aside. He slams the door of the room—Woohyun and Sunggyu’s room; Sungyeol’s for the past few days—behind him and turns to Woohyun.

“You’re helping me break out.”

Woohyun blinks. “Uh. What?”

Sungyeol throws his hands up in the air. “I can’t _stand_ it anymore, Woohyun! I’m going crazy locked away in here! Everything about this sucks, but it’s so much worse being trapped in this small space with nothing to do and everywhere I turn everything reminds me of who I’m _not_ right now. And we have no idea when I’ll be myself again so don’t even give me that ‘it’s just for a little while’ bullshit. It could be _forever_. I have to get out of here tomorrow. I have to.”

Woohyun looks torn. “But the hyungs have forbidden it and even CEO-nim when he came by and—“

“I don’t _care_! Let them kill me when they drag me back—at least I’ll know freedom for a little while.”

Sungyeol knows he’s being dramatic, but at this point he couldn’t care less. He can see Woohyun’s absolute commitment to the good of Infinite battling with his real desire to help (and possibly his sense of mischief, but then Woohyun always was Sungyeol’s favorite partner in crime for just that reason). 

“Sungyeol, you really can’t, you _have_ to stay here.”

Sungyeol takes a step closer to him, almost crossing his arms over his chest but then he remembers the way the guys all go loopy-eyed when he does that, so he just puts his hands on his hips instead. “If you don’t help me come up with a way to sneak out, I’ll just walk out the front door tomorrow after you all leave, I swear. Don’t think I won’t.”

This is the moment of truth. Because Woohyun _could_ just report this conversation to the managers and one of them would stay with him all day for as long as necessary, guarding him and making sure he can’t escape at all. Woohyun _could_ do that. But Sungyeol can see the battle in his eyes, and after a tense moment of Sungyeol glaring at him, his shoulders slump.

“Fine! Fine! I’ll help you come up with something. God, Sunggyu is so going to have my head for this, I hope you’re suitably grateful.”

Sungyeol smiles; he knew there was a reason he picked Woohyun.

The plan they come up with is remarkably simple—but elegant, Sungyeol insists, and Woohyun shakes his head with a grin. The only problem is that it requires the cooperation of the APink girls. 

“Don’t worry about that,” Woohyun says, waving his hand dismissively. “Ever since I heard Bomi fart at the salon, she’s been really flustered whenever I’m around. I’ll convince her to convince the others.”

Sungyeol has never been so thankful for Woohyun’s greasiness. He’s actually the opposite of smooth when it comes to relating to actual girls he’s interested in, but when he gets into idol-mode there’s no stopping him. Sungyeol has no doubts that he’ll be successful.

And he is. He’s only gone for twenty minutes before he saunters back into the room and flops down on Sunggyu’s bed beside Sungyeol, grinning widely and smugly. The smile is kind of dazzling in a way that confuses Sungyeol, so he pushes his face away with his hand (even as a girl, Sungyeol’s fingers are almost long enough to cover Woohyun’s whole face) though he withdraws it quickly when he feels the puff of Woohyun’s breath on his palm.

“I shouldn’t have let you do it—I should have just called Eunji myself. I knew you’d be way too proud of yourself. This is the last thing your ego needs.”

“I was _amazing_ ,” Woohyun smirks, reaching out and yanking on the end of Sungyeol’s ponytail in retaliation. “You should have seen me—no one on earth would have been able to resist me.”

“I would,” Sungyeol says, and he doesn’t understand why Woohyun’s smile flickers before settling down, only now it looks the slightest bit forced.

“Anyway, they’re in,” Woohyun says. “Tomorrow at 7:30. Be ready.”

“Oh, I will be.”

Woohyun gets ready to leave then to let Sungyeol get some sleep, but he walks backwards to the door, still talking, “I’ve only got stuff in the morning for a while and then I’m hitting the studio after that, so call me if you need to. And don’t get into trouble, okay? Behave yourself. If you end up getting into one of your scrapes, Sunggyu-hyung will kill me even deader than he already is going to.”

“I’ll be a perfect angel,” Sungyeol assures him, clasping his hands under his chin and blinking his eyelashes in exaggerated innocence. Woohyun runs into the wall, he’s laughing so hard.

“You look even more ridiculous doing that as a girl than you usually do!”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Sungyeol insists, pretending to be indifferent but really hiding a smile. “I’m the picture of virtue.”

Woohyun is still laughing as he opens the door, but Sungyeol calls out to him. “Hey, Woohyun?”

Woohyun spins to look at him strangely at the uncharacteristic seriousness in his voice. “Yeah?”

Sungyeol can’t look at Woohyun’s face right now for some reason, so he focuses on smoothing out the wrinkles in his skirt. “Thanks.”

“What are bodyguards for?”

 

 

Woohyun would be the first to admit that he’s pretty distracted through his schedules the next morning. At first he’s jittery, tapping his leg and checking his phone compulsively whenever he can, but he only relaxes a bit once he receives the text that says _success!!!!_. After that he’s still concerned, imagining all the things that could happen to Sungyeol if he wanders around Seoul alone. If Sungyeol was still a guy, he’d be less worried, of if the girl he’s worrying over were anyone other than Sungyeol, he’d be sure she could handle herself. But Sungyeol is reckless and impulsive _and_ a girl and Woohyun knows that the world is unfair enough that girls can’t always get away with being reckless and impulsive the way guys can. So he worries.

He’s done with his last schedule and has just been dropped off at the dorm to change before heading to the studio when he gets a call. He fumbles to answer it when he sees it’s Sungyeol.

“Yeol? You okay?”

“Woohyun, you have to save me!”

Woohyun’s heart grinds to a halt in his chest as all the things that could possibly happen to a girl alone in Seoul spring up inside his mind in full color. “Sungyeol,” he chokes. “Sungyeol—where are you?”

“They want to make me get a _bikini wax_ , Woohyun! They’re dragging me there! Why did no one ever tell me that APink was evil incarnate?”

Woohyun chokes again, this time in a mixture of lust at that visual and relieved laughter at the situation. It’s only now that he hears girlish laughter and chatter in the background. “You scared me to death, you jackass! I thought something had really happened to you!”

“Did you miss the part where they want to pour hot wax on my privates and rip all the hair out by its roots?”

Woohyun squeezes his eyes closed and grits his teeth, kind of wanting to strangle Sungyeol for doing this to him. “Sungyeol—“

“I’ve spent all morning with them, but I’ve got to get away now—let’s go do something this afternoon, Woohyun!”

Woohyun should really, really go to the studio. He really, really should. For a thousand reasons, from his commitment to Infinite to that violent look Sunggyu gets in his eyes when he’s angry, from proving to the CEO that he’s mature to the fact that the idea of spending a whole day alone with Sungyeol like a normal person is more appealing than is decent. 

“Come on, let’s hang out! It’ll be way more fun than you rotting all day in the studio!”

But Sungyeol is begging— _begging_ —and his voice is even more breathy than usual when it’s like this and— _No, Nam Woohyun, you have to go to the studio. You have to._

But: “Come play with me, Woohyun!”

“Text me where you are; I’m leaving now.”

He never stood a chance.

 

 

  
Sungyeol bounces to his feet as soon as he sees Woohyun approaching. “ _There_ you are! It took you forever! What are you wearing?”

Woohyun rolls his eyes and he probably grimaces, too, but Sungyeol can’t see it behind the plain black mask he’s wearing. His t-shirt is plain and black, too—not even a v-neck (unfortunately. Sungyeol can admit that Woohyun can pull off bare collarbones really, really well)—his jeans are a cheaper brand than Sungyeol even knew that he owned, his tennis shoes his very oldest and most worn. And the beanie on his head isn’t one of Sunggyu’s designer one, but a plain grey one that looks like it was bought from a street vendor. It’s all completely the opposite of how Woohyun usually presents himself—the Almighty Key is his best friend, after all. Honestly, if Sungyeol hadn’t spent the last few years having to know every detail of how Woohyun’s body moves in order to maintain 99.9% synchronicity while they dance, he probably wouldn’t even recognize him.

“The hardcore fans know most of my wardrobe,” Woohyun says impatiently as he joins Sungyeol by a fountain in the mall Sungyeol has been waiting in since he escaped from the APink girls (it turns out that they were kidding about the bikini wax—apparently they were enjoying teasing him as much as he usually enjoys teasing Sungjong—but he’s still glad to get away from all the estrogen. Even if he has plenty of his own now). “This was the most innocuous outfit I have.”

“Oh, yeah,” Sungyeol says, rolling his own eyes. “Because Infinite’s Woohyun couldn’t possibly be seen with a _girl_ in public.”

“No, he really couldn’t. Infinite’s Woohyun shouldn’t even be here—he should be in the studio. I’m already risking my neck more than I should be; I’m not about to possibly start a scandal.”

Sungyeol is still surprised that Woohyun even agreed to come in the first place. Woohyun can be immature and nearly as devious as Sungyeol, but he’s always so very responsible when it comes to Infinite and his duties towards it. When Sungyeol had made the call, he’d really just wanted to hear his voice; he thought he’d beg for a while and Woohyun would shut him down and then he’d wander around for the rest of the day on his own. But despite knowing that their management will be furious, Woohyun is _here_ , for reasons Sungyeol can’t really explain, but he doesn’t care because he’s just so glad he is.

“What do we want to do first?” Sungyeol asks, looking around the mall at the people milling around. It’s been forever since he’s been to a place like this without cameras flashing all around him; now the people more or less pass him by without a second glance. 

Or most of them do, at least—more than one guy had given him a once over as he sat on the edge of the fountain waiting for Woohyun. Some of the guys were young and cute and had just seemed to appreciate the view; Sungyeol had preened a bit, strangely flattered by the attention. But there were some others who had looked at him in a way that made him shrink back, and it didn’t matter whether they were attractive or not: just that look—the…possessiveness of it, the predatory edge—had freaked him out. He hadn’t expected that, hadn’t expected for it to make him feel like edging away, like he needed to tug the hem of his not-that-short skirt down lower: he always thought girls who complained about attention from guys were just doing it for more attention. But when those men looked at him like that, it made him feel small and dirty, almost like they’d actually touched him even though they never got close enough to do that. For the first time, Sungyeol understands why women are sometimes afraid of men. It makes him feel better to know that Woohyun is beside him now, though he hates that. He’s always wandered around on his own, from the time he was just a kid, and even if he can’t do it often now because he’s too busy with idol stuff and because he gets recognized, the fact that he feels nervous doing it in this body pisses him off. Nobody should have to feel that way.

“I’m starving, let’s get something to eat first,” Woohyun says, interrupting his thoughts. “And you’re treating, remember—this bodyguard hasn’t been paid yet.”

Sungyeol rolls his eyes and grabs Woohyun’s arm to drag him behind. “Fine. But I’m choosing the restaurant.”

Sungyeol is craving curry, so he chooses a small place he knows makes a great one. They get a booth tucked into a back corner, and their waitress is an older lady who doesn’t look like she’s even heard of pop music, so Woohyun finally takes off his mask now that there’s very little chance of them being spotted.

“So our plan worked?” Woohyun asks after they’ve ordered.

“Just like I knew it would,” Sungyeol confirms with a nod. “I snuck down to their dorm and then we walked right past the security guard at the front desk and then the fans across the street, all in a big pack. And as we were getting in their van, Naeun said something really loud about how excited she gets when their sisters get to visit. And then we pulled away.”

Woohyun laughs appreciatively, and have his eyes always looked like that when he does? Sungyeol has noticed it a time or two before, but it seems more obvious now. Must be the light in here. “I knew it would work! I see they dressed you up before you did that, though.”

Sungyeol grimaces. “They said the outfits I put together looked like a blind person picked them out. They made me wear this stuff because they said that no one would ever believe I was related to anyone as stylish as one of them if I didn’t look nice.”

Again with the laughing and the sparkling. Woohyun’s teeth are really white. Sungyeol has always meant to ask him if he uses those whitening strips, but he somehow always forgets. “Well, they did a good job. You look really hot.”

Sungyeol squirms a little in his chair, not sure of how he feels about Woohyun saying that to him, even in so light a tone. He likes getting compliments, maybe more than he should, and he appreciates them from Woohyun more than from any of the other guys, mostly because he knows that Woohyun wouldn’t say something he didn’t really mean, something he didn’t really want Sungyeol to know even if the tone he uses is teasing (as it always is when he tells Sungyeol he looks hot, but when Woohyun says it, Sungyeol has a bit more confidence because he knows he looks _good_ ). But it’s different now, somehow. “I guess.” 

He _had_ been pleased with how he looked when he saw himself in the black skirt and the pink shirt, his hair brushed and parted on the side. Some of the girls had wanted to put makeup on him and jewelry, too, but Eunji had stopped them, insisting the earrings Sungyeol was already wearing were enough and that he was pretty enough without any makeup. He’d liked hearing from all of them how pretty he was, though he’d been a little less thrilled when a few of them had started talking about how they wished they had his legs and how it wasn’t fair that his skin was so much better than theirs and stuff like that. And after a few hours in the bra—even this new one without an underwire—he’s already ready to kill someone again. It must be rough to be a girl.

“The shoes don’t really match the outfit, though,” Woohyun teases.

Sungyeol looks down at the pink flip-flops he’s wearing and the way his feet stick out over the backs and fronts just a little too much. “None of them had any shoes that would fit me—I couldn’t cram my feet into any of them. It was terrible.”

Woohyun laughs a lot, Sungyeol has noticed lately. He didn’t at first, not when they were trainees. He’d seemed cold and more than a little arrogant then, bossing the other guys around and being obnoxiously competitive with Sunggyu. Sungyeol hadn’t liked him at all, had thought his commitment to the rules and the way he worked himself nearly to death was the sign of a buzzkill with a stick up his ass. But Woohyun had thawed a lot as time passed, and eventually Sungyeol realized that he worked so hard because he wanted to debut _so bad_ and had been convinced that if he made any slip-up at all, he would lose his dream. By the time he started showing his more mischievous side and joining Sungyeol or Dongwoo in their silliness, Sungyeol had figured out that the greasiness, his other least-favorite thing about Woohyun at the beginning, was just what he thought the fans wanted—and that he would do anything to make them happy. Sungyeol doesn’t really get that; he’s not really concerned with the happiness of people he doesn’t know, not like Woohyun is. But there’s something weirdly admirable about how much Woohyun wants to make people happy, and now that Sungyeol understands him, now that they’ve become close over the past year or two, he’s found that he likes him. A lot. Maybe the most of any of the members. Myungsoo is still his best friend, the one Sungyeol falls into place beside by default, and Sungyeol doesn’t think that’s likely to change anytime soon (despite how the staring Myungsoo can’t seem to control), but sometimes Sungyeol thinks that he feels most like himself when he’s with Woohyun, that he can be as silly as he wants to be or as serious as he needs to be and Woohyun won’t judge him. He knows everyone else would think that’s crazy considering that they all think Woohyun is so fake, but it doesn’t stop it from being true.

“So what did you guys do after you snuck out?” Woohyun asks, taking a sip of his drink. 

“I watched them at dance practice for a while—they were working on new choreo,” Sungyeol answers, fiddling with his chopsticks.

Woohyun smirks. “I bet you enjoyed that.”

Sungyeol shrugs uncomfortably, not quite sure how to answer that. Normally there’s nothing he’d like better than to watch girls groups dance and sweat. But it had been weird this time, because he’d gotten turned on. Which shouldn’t have been a surprise, but it was: he didn’t get hard because there was nothing to _get_ hard. Instead he’d just felt tingly between his legs, and it had been so strange, so uncomfortable—not the sensation itself, but the unfamiliarity of it—that he’d pressed his legs together and tried not to look like he was watching without actually look at them. He’d been relieved when it was over and he doesn’t really want to think about it now.

“Then we went to the salon and they all got ready for whatever they have next,” he says, setting those thoughts aside. “And that was when they decided that I needed to get a _bikini wax_.” He spits out the last words. “Girls are crazy. Why do they do things like that to themselves?”

Woohyun looks a little twitchy at the question, but he shrugs. “You watch porn. You know a lot of guys like it when they’re like that. I guess they’re trying to please them.”

“Well, they should tell those guys to fuck off, because that’s just stupid.”

Woohyun arcs a brow. “No matter how much you like it when you see it in porn?”

Sungyeol shakes his head, hair falling around his shoulders in a way he’s still not used to. “Even then. They shouldn’t have to do painful stuff just because guys like it.”

Woohyun grins, and Sungyeol marvels yet again that Woohyun doesn’t think he looks like an idol. He has a movie-star smile, except it’s even better when he’s not doing it to charm anyone. “You’re sounding pretty feminist, Yeol.”

“Well, maybe I am,” Sungyeol answers, a bit sullen. “Everything’s different when you actually think about doing it yourself.”

Their food arrives then, cutting off the conversation, and Sungyeol starts scarfing it down despite how hot it is, waving a hand in front of his mouth and opening it in a vain attempt to cool it off. 

“You’re not being very ladylike, Sungyeol,” Woohyun says with a grin, taking an impolitely large bite himself. 

“Do I look like I give a damn?” Sungyeol asks around a mouthful of food. “And why do you care anyway? If you’re going to be like that, I’ll kick your ass, even if I am wearing a skirt.” Not that he could. But that doesn’t stop him from threatening.

“ _I_ don’t care,” Woohyun says. “But I think she does,” he adds, shifting his eyes to something to Sungyeol’s left.

Tapping his chopsticks against his lips, Sungyeol glances over his shoulder and sees an older couple seated at the next table. The lady is glaring at him like he personally offended her—and Sungyeol notices she isn’t paying the slightest bit of attention to Woohyun. Feeling annoyed, Sungyeol takes another big bite of curry, then grins as widely as he can, gums showing, waving at the lady jauntily. She huffs and turns away, and when Sungyeol turns to the front again, Woohyun is laughing so hard he’s almost face-down in his curry. 

“I can’t believe you just did that, you idiot,” Woohyun gasps. “You are so ridiculous!”

Still annoyed at the woman but somehow also kind of pleased by Woohyun’s reaction, Sungyeol takes a swig of water. “She should mind her own business, old bat. I wasn’t doing anything to her. Why do so many people turn into such cranks when they get old?”

Woohyun doesn’t have an answer to that, but they’re too busy eating for a while to worry much about that, and by the time they slow down again, they’re ready to talk about other things. After a while, the waitress appears with their check, and Sungyeol reaches out to take it—repaying his bodyguard. Except his hand closes on empty air, because she’s pulled it back and is frowning at him.

“Won’t your boyfriend be paying for it?” Sungyeol gapes at her as she turns to glare at Woohyun. “Well, won’t you?”

Woohyun blinks and opens his mouth to answer, but Sungyeol cuts him off. “No, that’s okay, it was my turn. I’ve got it this time.”

But she still refuses to give him the check, waving it under Woohyun’s nose. “How on earth did you get such a nice, pretty young lady when you won’t even pay for her dinner? And with her looking so lovely today, too! You ought to be ashamed!”

Sungyeol isn’t sure what his looks have to do with anything—like if he weren’t pretty, he wouldn’t deserve dinner or something—but he’s too busy trying to hold in his laughter at the way Woohyun is shrinking under the woman’s disapproval. “Ajumma, I’m not hi—her boyfriend,” he protests, looking more cowed than Sungyeol ever sees him. “We’re just friends, and h—she was paying me back for something!”

The waitress smacks Woohyun’s head with her notebook, causing Sungyeol to completely lose control over his laughter and dissolve into giggles. “And you won’t even call her your girlfriend! Well, if she isn’t your girlfriend, what’s wrong with you? Huh? Pretty girl like this will get snapped up before you can blink, if you don’t treat her better!”

Sungyeol is still laughing hysterically, but he manages to protest that. “I’m not going to get snapped up, ajumma—it’s not like I’m a hotteok. I’d have to choose someone else,” he points out.

“Well, I know you won’t choose this lazy bum. And I thought you looked like such a sweet couple when you came in, the two of you having such a nice time together. But you deserve better than some stingy kid who won’t pay for you!”

“Okay, okay!” Woohyun interjects, finally getting a word in before the irate old woman can continue. “I’ll pay for it!” He grabs the check and pulls out his wallet, and the waitress sniffs before looking at Sungyeol.

“You just remember this, how much it took him to pay for you, how he wouldn’t even call you his girlfriend. That’s a bad sign, and if you end up regretting him later, remember that I warned you.”

She takes Woohyun’s money and marches off, leaving behind a still-gasping Sungyeol and a brow-beaten Woohyun. 

“Honestly, Woohyun, which one are you more upset about?” Sungyeol asks as they stand to leave. “That you just got told off by an old lady in a public place or that you had to pay for my meal?”

“Yeah, yeah, very funny,” Woohyun says, shoving Sungyeol with his arm, which causes Sungyeol to teeter for a moment since he isn’t used to balancing in this new body. Behind them, the sneering old woman who hadn’t approved of Sungyeol’s table manners gasps. Sungyeol ignores it, finally calming from his laughing fit.

“So,” he says, watching as Woohyun bends over the table to take one last swig of his drink before they go. “Where to next, oppa?”

Woohyun practically jackknifes, and Sungyeol honestly thinks he’s going to choke to death, hunched over and hacking like he’ll never breath again. Sungyeol pounds on his back in alarm, watching as Woohyun’s face passes right by red and straight on to purple. “Woohyun, are you alright?”

“What the _fuck_ , Sungyeol?” Woohyun wheezes as he coughs, and Sungyeol relaxes a bit, because at least he can breathe if he’s talking. Sungyeol really didn’t want to stand here and watch Nam Woohyun suffocate right in front of his eyes. 

“What?”

“Why the _fuck_ would you call me that?” Woohyun’s eyes are still watering, but his face has died back down to red now, though he’s still coughing some. Sungyeol thumps his back again, just to be safe.

“Well…you’re older and we’re in public, so….”

When Woohyun straightens and meets his gaze, there’s something Sungyeol doesn’t understand in his eyes. Sungyeol tries to label it, but comes up short; all he knows is that it’s really _heavy_. “Just…don’t call me that again,” Woohyun says, and he still sounds breathless. “Just stick to Woohyun, okay?”

Suddenly feeling self-conscious for reasons he can’t quite figure out, Sungyeol forces a laugh. “Haha—you should have seen your face!”

Something in the way Woohyun looks at him makes Sungyeol think that he knows just how forced that laugh is, but Woohyun just sighs and ties his mask back on. “Come on. Let’s get out of here. This has been one of the weirder meals in my life and I’m ready to move on.”

They end up in the arcade, trying out all of the games like they haven’t since—when was the last time Sungyeol was in an arcade? Was it back during _Birth of a Family_ when they left Sunggyu with the dogs? Yeah, it was definitely then. But even the lack of practice doesn’t explain how bad he is at every single one of the things he tries, from DDR to ball tosses. Of course it’s because he’s not used to this body, just like why he had so much trouble with the choreography two days ago. But somehow it’s not as frustrating as that failed dancing, not when Woohyun is laughing so hard beside him. It turns into a bit of a joke, Sungyeol exaggerating his failure at every game, Woohyun laughing so hard behind his mask that he has to clutch his sides, which makes Sungyeol laugh, too, feeling less self-conscious than he has since this whole thing started. 

They finally turn to the pinball and video games and it turns out that Sungyeol has a much easier time with those and ends up actually beating Woohyun a few times, while Woohyun pretends to be devastated over being beaten by a girl. By the time they stumble out, still laughing, into the regular light of the rest of the mall, Sungyeol is almost feeling like himself again. Except for, you know, the whole no-dick thing.

“Okay,” Sungyeol says, taking out the tie from his hair to redo the ponytail that was falling out from the enthusiasm their play. “That was pretty great, but now I think I want—“

“Can I touch your hair?”

Sungyeol blinks at Woohyun, who has snapped his mouth shut as though he hadn’t meant to say that at all. Which—why on earth _would_ he say that? Sungyeol feels like he just took a blow to the head.

Woohyun is red again, looking so pained Sungyeol thinks he might be willing to kill himself to put himself out of his misery. “Sorry, sorry—forget I said any—“

“Okay.”

Now it’s Woohyun’s turn to blink at _him_ , eyes wide in disbelief at what Sungyeol just said. Sungyeol isn’t sure why he said it, either—maybe it’s because he actually asked, where Dongwoo just reaches out and Myungsoo eases up behind him to run his fingers through it in a way that kind of freaks Sungyeol out (he’d finally had to flat-out tell Myungsoo that is was weird, and, to his credit, Myungsoo had looked abashed and hasn’t done it again since). Neither one of them had _asked_ (though Dongwoo had apologized after catching himself), and Woohyun has been awesome today, and Sungyeol can’t think of any particular reason to say no, except that this whole thing is really strange and he still doesn’t know why Woohyun would ask in the first place.

But he doesn’t say anything as Woohyun reaches out, though he shivers a bit as Woohyun’s rough fingers brush against the soft skin on his neck. Woohyun’s eyes are really dark and intent as he slides his fingers through the loose locks of Sungyeol’s hair. Sungyeol bites his lip and fights the urge to step back; it’s not the same kind of urge he’s gotten with leering strangers, not coming from a place of fear or even discomfort. It’s just that he feels something right now, and he’s not sure what it is, but he knows he’s felt it a few times before with Woohyun and that it’s really too big to analyze.

All he knows is he can’t take his eyes off of Woohyun’s face, off the intensity of his gaze—directed to where his fingers are stroking through Sungyeol’s hair—the way his lips part just the slightest bit as he concentrates (and Woohyun has always had obscene lips, even Sungyeol has noticed that). They’re standing in the middle of a busy mall, people rushing around them left and right, but somehow this moment feels very still and quiet—till Woohyun suddenly blinks and jerks back, returned to the present moment like the snap of a rubber band.

“What were you saying you wanted to do next?” Woohyun asks, voice overly casual, and it takes a moment for Sungyeol to catch up with him.

“Oh, uh—oh, I was going to say that I could pay your wages by treating you to ice cream. To make up for lunch, you know,” Sungyeol says, grateful that that strange, suspended moment is over. Woohyun looks like he’s trying to pretend it never happened and Sungyeol is more than okay with that.

“Ice cream. Sure. Sounds great. But, uh—maybe you should give me the money and I’ll go get it. Just to make sure I don’t have to get another lecture from a stranger.”

“Sure.” Sungyeol fumbles in his pocket—this skirt actually does have a pocket; he’d refused to lug around a purse all day—and withdraws his card, handing it over quickly and sighing with relief as Woohyun assures him he’ll be right back and hurries away.

Sungyeol sits himself down on a bench sighs, sort of relieved for the moment Woohyun just bought them apart but kind of grumpy that they even needed it—they’d been having so much _fun_ until that weirdness, and now things feel strange. It’s got to be because of his girliness—Woohyun wouldn’t have asked that if Sungyeol had been in his regular body. And just when they’d spent the past two hours having so much fun that Sungyeol had almost managed to convince himself that Woohyun just saw _Sungyeol_ when he looked at him. But apparently not or that moment wouldn’t have happened.

Sungyeol flops back on the bench, crossing his arms and not even remembering to cross his legs like a lady as Chorong had ordered him this morning until some disapproving middle-aged woman shoots him a look so sharp he shoots up straight and slams his knees together.

As soon as she moves on, Sungyeol sighs dramatically. Being a girl sucks.

 

 

Woohyun’s stomach drops to the vicinity of his ankles when he sees the guy standing in front of the bench where he left Sungyeol. He speeds up, grip firm on the ice cream in his hands, really hoping that that it’s just a coincidence and that Sungyeol had moved to another bench to wait or something. But even as he wishes it, he knows it isn’t true, and his body tenses up. 

_Fuck. I shouldn’t have left him alone._ But he’d needed a minute to get himself back together after he made a fool of himself with the hair thing. It had been so silky and shiny when Sungyeol let it down, and the question had popped out even before he knew he was thinking it, and even though as soon as it was out he’d wanted nothing more than to forget (and convince Sungyeol to forget) that he’d said it at all, when Sungyeol (shockingly) gave him permission, he hadn’t been able to resist—and it had felt as amazing as it looked. He’s had moments of wanting to touch Sungyeol’s hair back when he was himself, though he never, ever would have asked. But he had an excuse this time—he could always say, ‘It’s just because you’re a girl’ even if he knows deep down that that’s not true—and he’s wanted to touch Sungyeol for so long that he just _had_ to take the opportunity. And when he’d snapped out of it, he’d been so embarrassed that he’d latched onto the excuse to get away. It had taken the entire way to the ice cream shop for him to stop mentally kicking himself, and after he’d ordered the ice cream (he hadn’t asked Sungyeol what he wanted, but he knows anyways), he’d paid and spent the walk back trying to convince himself that the hair thing hadn’t happened at all. _What the fuck must he think of me now?_

But honestly Sungyeol’s probably not thinking of him now at all, not if that guy is doing what Woohyun thinks he’s doing. He tries to tell himself that it might not be that bad, but he knows Sungyeol’s temper and how on edge he is right now. He has to fight to keep from breaking out into a run.

_Fuck._ Just as he suspected, the guys is standing _over_ the bench where Woohyun left Sungyeol, using his height to intimidate whoever is sitting there, and even though Woohyun can’t see his bandmate’s face because the guy is blocking his view, he catches a glimpse of long, pale legs. _Fuck._

“Come on, it’ll be fun,” the guy is saying as Woohyun rushes up. The guy doesn’t even notice him, his attention all focused on Sungyeol, who’s still sitting on the bench but is now clutching the seat of it with both hands so tight that Woohyun wouldn’t be surprised if his bones broke right through his skin. Woohyun almost hurls himself at the guy, ready to tear him apart even though he’s taller and broader than Woohyun is, but then he realizes the look on Sungyeol’s face isn’t terror. It’s anger.

“I already told you no three times,” Sungyeol says, tossing his hair over his shoulder with an attitude that reminds Woohyun of Sungjong, and Woohyun doesn’t know if it’s a natural move for anyone with hair that long or if Sungyeol is purposefully trying to look sassy and feminine. “I don’t have any desire to spend any time with you at all, so go away and leave me alone.”

_Oh, Sungyeol._ Woohyun has to hold himself back, but he just manages it; he knows Sungyeol, knows how touchy he is and how that touchiness has only been magnified by what he’s going through. Woohyun’s not going to step in unless he absolutely has to. No matter how much he wants to just shove all this guy aside, grab Sungyeol and run away.

“Oh, so you want to be convinced, then?” the guy says, leaning over to drag a finger along Sungyeol’s bare neck and flick a lock of hair aside. Woohyun just barely holds himself still, body almost shaking with the effort, but Sungyeol slaps the hand away, glaring up at the guy.

“Don’t you speak Korean?” Oh, Sungyeol is angry all right, but Woohyun knows him well enough to realize that it’s more about frustration and confusion as to why this guy won’t listen to him than it even really is about the touching. “Why are you not listening to me? I want you to leave me alone!”

“You’re not being very nice to me.”

Sungyeol flushes red and Woohyun knows he’s about to blow, so he decides enough is enough; he throws himself over to Sungyeol, making sure that he’s between Sungyeol and the guy.

“Woohyun,” Sungyeol says in surprise, blinking up at him as though he’d forgotten Woohyun even existed. Woohyun looks down at him and sees not the face of a girl superimposed over that of his bandmate as he has been seeing Sungyeol for the past few days, but the picture that strangers must see: a beautiful girl, tall but very slim, with the most gorgeous eyes in the world and a face almost distracting in its prettiness. Actually, Woohyun realizes, trade ‘girl’ for ‘boy’ in that description, and that’s exactly who Sungyeol is all the time.

But this face is so feminine, this body so very slight that Sungyeol must look like easy pickings to any guy who wants his attention. The fucker.

“You okay?” Woohyun asks in a low voice, and the surprise fades away from Sungyeol’s face, the anger returning. He opens his mouth to speak, but the he thug—who’s actually probably just a university student or something and who isn’t the slightest bit thuggish in appearance, only in Woohyun’s mind—interrupts. “Hey.”

Woohyun turns to look at him, wishing for the millionth time in his life that he was taller. He’s in good shape, yeah, but this guy is about as tall as Sungyeol normally is, and he’s got more bulk to him than Woohyun does. The guy tilts his head to the side and looks Woohyun up and down. Woohyun has never been so thankful for his mask. “She yours?”

Sungyeol squawks behind him in protest, but Woohyun takes Sungyeol’s ice cream and pushes it into Sungyeol’s hand. Sungyeol almost drops it, but by the time he’s got a good grip on it, Woohyun has grabbed his other hand and interlaced their fingers, turning back to the guy. “She’s not anybody’s, but she’s with me. And we’re leaving.”

With that, he pulls Sungyeol up off of the bench and steers them away, trying his best not to clutch Sungyeol’s hand too hard. Even in his panicked anger, he doesn’t want to hurt Sungyeol.

“Woohyun, what the—“

“Hey, man!” The guy is calling after them, but Woohyun doesn’t slow or turn to face him. “Sorry! I didn’t know she was with somebody!”

“Woohyun, let go! I want to go back there and tell him off!”

There’s no way in hell Woohyun is going to let that happen, but he does release Sungyeol’s hand, turning to him to check that he’s okay. Sungyeol, though, is still bristling with anger. 

“What a fucking idiot! He didn’t listen to me when I said no, but you turn up and he’s all, ‘Oh, sorry, man’. What about that makes sense?”

Woohyun shakes his head; he should have known Sungyeol wouldn’t understand. “He doesn’t look at you and see a person, Sungyeol, he looks at you and sees a girl.”

“That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever fucking—“

“I _know_. I know it’s stupid. But it’s true. He sees that I’m a guy, so I’m a person, he has to at least acknowledge that. But what you think or want doesn’t matter, not when you look like you’re female to him.”

“That’s fucking idiotic! I should go back there and deck him—he can’t talk to me like that!”

Woohyun knows he won’t really do it, but it doesn’t stop him from grabbing Sungyeol’s hand in panic. “Yes, he can, Sungyeol! Don’t you get it? He can talk to you any way he wants! He could break you in half with his pinky! If he wanted to, he doesn’t _have_ to take no for an answer: he could _hurt_ you.”

Sungyeol jerks back as though the thought shocks him, as though he hadn’t even considered that at all. “He wouldn’t—“

“No, probably not,” Woohyun agrees, almost vibrating in fearful frustration. “There are people all around and he was dressed like someone who cares what people think about him. He probably wouldn’t risk it here. But if he’d been another kind of guy or if you were in a different place—“ He lets out an explosive sigh, knotting his hands into fists. “He could have _hurt_ you.”

What little eyebrows Sungyeol has furrow as Sungyeol takes this in, his face twisted in emotion. It’s so weird seeing this expression on this face, so similar and yet so different than it is on Sungyeol’s real face. Woohyun tries to focus on that, forcing himself to relax and unclench his fists. His heart is slowing down, finally, now that Sungyeol is beside him and away from that guy. Woohyun hadn’t really thought, intellectually at least, that anything would happen, but you never _knew_ , especially not with Sungyeol’s temper added to the situation. 

“Look,” Woohyun says, hating the look on Sungyeol’s face but needing reassurance before he changes the subject, “just…next time a guy wants your attention and you don’t want to give it to him, make some sort of excuse and get out of there, okay? It’s safer.”

Sungyeol scowls mutinously, the look setting oddly on his soft features. “That’s _ridiculous_. I shouldn’t have to do that. No one should have to do that.”

“I know. I know that, but the world is a mess, okay? And it’s a bigger mess for girls.”

“God,” Sungyeol says, shaking his head in amazement, eyes lighting in something like admiration. “How do they manage it all? Girls are unbelievable.”

“Oh, yeah,” Woohyun mutters. “Just what you needed: to like girls even _more_.”  
Sungyeol gives him a strange look and opens his mouth—no doubt to ask what that meant—but then he looks down. “My ice cream’s melting,” he observes, transferring his cone to his other hand and licking the melted ice cream off his thumb. Woohyun hurriedly looks away.

“Yeah, let’s find a place to sit down where I can take my mask off so I can eat mine, too.”

Sungyeol agrees, apparently ready to put the run-in with his would-be suitor behind him, but they barely make it ten feet when an attractive, well-dressed woman stops them.

“Your girlfriend is gorgeous,” she says to Woohyun after a quick bow.

Woohyun isn’t at all sure how to react to that. “Uh, thanks?”

But she’s already turning to Sungyeol. “Have you ever considered modeling?”

Sungyeol stares. “Well, I’ve done a little—“

“Do you have representation?” the woman asks eagerly.

“For modeling? No, not rea—“

“Here. Call me. Please.” She holds out a card and Sungyeol takes it, looking a bit dazed as the woman bows again and wishes them a good day, walking away briskly.

Sungyeol and Woohyun stare down at the card in Sungyeol’s hand. “Am I really that pretty like this?” Sungyeol asks.

Woohyun doesn’t even have to think. “Yes.” Sungyeol looks up at him quizzically. “If I saw you on the street, I’d assume you were one,” Woohyun continues.

A grin steals across Sungyeol’s face, small at first, but spreading till his gums are showing, and the site of those small teeth and pink gums—unchanged even in this new body—is enough to make Woohyun forget every bit of nervous anger he’d felt earlier. “Yeah?” Sungyeol asks.

For once, Woohyun doesn’t let himself take the time to consider whether it’s wise to say what he says next; he just says it. “But it’s the same when you’re a guy. You were born to model.”

Sungyeol rolls his eyes. “You’re just saying that because I’m tall and thin.”

“It’s not that at all!” Woohyun protests. “I mean, sure, you’re built like a model, but it’s also how you hold yourself and how you walk and your face and just your whole…vibe.” He stops himself before he can say something that will give him away—any more than he already has, _idiot_ — wincing at the thought, but Sungyeol is laughing again, rolling his eyes, and Woohyun is so relieved to see him happy and laughing that he forgets his own embarrassment. 

“Why am I even listening to your opinion? You bragged _so much_ about how you used to be a model before you were a trainee, but you were second-to-last in Fashion King!” Sungyeol chortles.

“Yeah, and who was last?” he points out, kicking Sungyeol lightly in feigned annoyance. “You were the only one who was rated worse than I was!”

“Because I was honest and said I didn’t care about fashion! That rating was total bullshit—it was all about Myungsoo’s face and the fact that I didn’t actually care and actually said it. It wasn’t about our pictures, and if they’d really wanted to measure our fashion sense they would have had us pick out our clothes ourselves. But I knew right from the beginning Myungsoo would win; they always get dazzled by his face.”

“Well, now you can brag that you were recruited off the street, too,” Woohyun points out, nodding towards the card. “Myungsoo’s not the only one who’s so good-looking that random people approach him.”

“That’s right!” Sungyeol exclaims with glee. “I’m going to rub it in his face when we get home!”

Sungyeol is in a much better mood after that (which puts Woohyun in a much better mood, too), almost skipping as they find a place to sit on a bench behind a huge planter of ferns. There’s a wall in front of them, so nobody’s likely to pass by; Woohyun takes off his mask to eat his ice cream. The cone isn’t even halfway to his mouth when Sungyeol’s phone starts ringing. Sungyeol fishes it out of his pocket and grimaces when he sees who’s calling.

“It’s Sunggyu-hyung. He must have come home and discovered me gone.”

“Are you going to answer it?” Woohyun asks, taking a lick of his ice cream.

“No way.” Sungyeol presses the ignore button and shoves the phone back into his pocket. “He can yell at me when we get home. I’m going to enjoy my freedom while I still can.”

The phone continues to buzz in Sungyeol’s pocket until he just turns it off altogether, and a moment after that, Woohyun’s phone pings to let him know he has a text.

“Leader?” Sungyeol asks, licking ice cream off his lips (Woohyun isn’t enthralled by the sight. No, not at all).

“Look.” He holds his phone so Sungyeol can read the words: _if ur w/yeol im going to kill you_

Sungyeol laughs, delighted. “You are going to be in so much trouble! Probably more than me because he _expects_ me to screw up!”

“Just remember what I said about throwing you under the bus,” Woohyun warns, turning off his phone, too as it starts to ring insistently. He’s already in enough trouble with Sunggyu, he might as well put off dealing with it until they get back home.

Sungyeol cackles as he chomps down on his ice cream cone. “You’re going down with me, Woohyunnie. Just you wait and see.”

Sungyeol is always adorable when he laughs, but watching him snicker into his ice cream with all that pretty hair falling around his shoulders, he’s even cuter than ever. “If I _don’t_ sell you out, won’t that be coddling you?” he asks, not even paying much attention to what he’s saying, not when he can’t talk his eyes away from Sungyeol’s happy face. “I can’t just take the fall with you because you’re a girl right now.”

“Omo! What would all your fans think?” Sungyeol demands in mock shock, his face still creased with laughter. There’s a bit of ice cream smeared on his bottom lip, and his eyes are crinkling at the corners as he laughs. “They all think you’re such a gentleman and so good with the ladies! But you’re really no better than those—“

Later, Woohyun will hate himself for this. Later, he’ll curse himself and wrack his brains, trying to understand how he could possibly be so stupid. Later, he’ll convince himself that he’s the worst friend in the world and that no one has ever done anything as terrible as what he did to Sungyeol.

But this is now, and in this moment he’s not thinking of anything at all, because in this moment he’s kissing Sungyeol.

He’s spent a lot of time fantasizing about kissing Sungyeol, even if he hadn’t been willing to admit that even to himself. Every time he’s found himself fixating on Sungyeol’s mouth, imagining what it would be like to feel it against his own, he’s tried to wrench his mind out of those thoughts, but the gravitational pull of them was just too strong to fight. He’s told himself that it’s just because he has no access to girls, practically living the life of a monk while being asked to exude sex appeal for people he’s never going to speak to; he doesn’t have any other options, so his hormone-driven brain has latched onto the nearest available body to perv on; but he eventually reached the point where he noticed that he’s most attracted to those lips when they’re saying something snarky—or laughing—or saying Woohyun’s name. 

Whenever he realizes that his mind is tracing the lines of Sungyeol’s legs, he tells himself that it’s because he’d seen Sungyeol in a dress with a wig and makeup and he’d looked like a girl, and it’s that girl—who inconveniently doesn’t exist—that he’s really attracted to; but a part of him knows that that’s a lie, because when he pictures running his hands up those legs, having them spread for him, coaxing them to wrap around his waist, Sungyeol isn’t wearing a dress at all, and the wig is nowhere in sight. 

The first couple of times he found himself dreaming about Sungyeol’s long, pale body hot and sweaty against his, he’d reminded himself that dreams don’t mean anything, that they’re just a random accumulation of junk in your brain, the mind’s way of sorting through all the flotsam and jetsam that builds up in the course of your waking hours, and if you have a sex dream about your fat gym teacher or your pretty cousin, that doesn’t actually mean you’re attracted to them. But the dreams have kept happening and happening, and so Woohyun just tries not to think of them at all after he’s jerked himself off in the shower, but it doesn’t really work.

He’s known. He’s known for a while now that it’s Sungyeol, that Sungyeol is the one who draws him in in ways no one else ever has before, that it’s Sungyeol that he wants, and not just because his skin looks so ridiculously soft, and not just because he has the prettiest mouth, but because Sungyeol has a witty mind and Sungyeol loves life and Sungyeol is always, always honest and Sungyeol will try anything and Sungyeol has the greatest laugh in the world and Sungyeol makes _him_ laugh and Sungyeol is fucking amazing.

He’s known, but he’s never acted on it, because—well, because there are a million reasons not to. Because it could affect Infinite, and Infinite is everything Woohyun ever wanted, and Infinite is everything he’s worked so hard for, and Infinite isn’t just him, it’s six other people who he loves so much it scares him. Because no one would approve: his parents would be horrified, the other guys would probably be disgusted (maybe not? But he doesn’t _know_ , and it’s so _hard_ ), and if the public ever found out, his career—and Sungyeol’s—would be ground to powder and he’d never be able to put it back together again. Because everyone says it’s wrong, and people make gross jokes about it, and he doesn’t actually know anyone who’s with another person of the same gender and is happy. Because he can already picture the looks in people’s eyes if they ever knew: the disgust, the revulsion, the disappointment, the anger. Because…because Sungyeol could push him away, Sungyeol could reject him—maybe laughing, maybe recoiling in disgust, and it wouldn’t matter how he did it, because the fact of it would kill Woohyun, he knows that.

There are so, so many reasons, and Woohyun knows each one of them. Woohyun thinks too much, goes over things in his head till they’re worn to tatters; he knows that weight and consequences of everything—he knows the weight and consequences of _this_.

And right now, there are more reasons than there usually are _not_ to do or say any of the things he’s wanted to do or say to Sungyeol. Just when he’d thought he couldn’t carry any more reasons, Sungyeol had woken up as a girl and Woohyun found himself staggering under the weight of dozens more.

He knows all that. But somehow, in this kiss—achingly tender and so full of the yearning that’s been building up inside of him—none of that exists. For just this moment, everything is Sungyeol’s lips under his, Sungyeol’s warmth beside him, Sungyeol’s scent in his lungs. And nothing else matters.

And then.

And then.

Sungyeol jerks back so forcefully the bench shakes, and he _shoves_ Woohyun away with all his strength. Woohyun feels the arm of the bench slam into his back, the surprise of it jarring through him even more than the pain, gasping in shock and pain and the awe that’s left behind in the wake of Sungyeol’s lips.

“You _asshole_.” Sungyeol jerks the back of his trembling hand across his lips, hard, and the sight of it makes Woohyun want to die. 

“Sungyeol—“

“I _trusted_ you.” Sungyeol’s cheeks are so white he looks like he might pass out at any moment, his face contorted almost ugliness in its emotions, his hands still trembling. And his eyes—are they wet? Woohyun has never hated himself as much as he does in this moment.

“Sungyeol, no, it’s not what you’re thinking—“

Sunyeol laughs, a jerky, mirthless sound, and it’s the worst thing Woohyun has ever heard. “I felt like _myself_ with you.” His voice isn’t raised, isn’t even as loud as it usually is, but it’s so raw and… _wrong_. “And I told myself it was because you saw _me_ when you looked at me. I told myself that, and I actually _believed_ it.”

“Sungyeol, I swear—“

“ _Fuck. You._ ” Woohyun has never in his life heard anyone pour such anger, such bitterness into two words. Sungyeol lurches upright and it isn’t till Woohyun sees Sungyeol smack his hands away that he realizes he’s reached out to him. “Don’t you dare touch me again, not _ever_.”

Sungyeol takes a few stumbling steps backward, and Woohyun wants to jump up, wants to run to him, wants to do _something_ , but he can’t move, motionless as if he’s just been turned to stone. His own voice is shaking. “Sungyeol, it’s not like that, it _isn’t_ , it’s—“

“Go to hell, Nam Woohyun.”

And then Sungyeol is gone, lurching away and into a passing crowd, almost slipping in his flimsy shoes, and then he disappears altogether, and Woohyun is left alone on the bench, a soggy ice cream cone in his hand, hating himself more than he’s ever hated anything.


	4. Chapter 4

Woohyun feels so shitty when he finally gets home, so guilty and stupid and self-loathing, that he doesn’t even fight when Sunggyu appears out of nowhere as soon as Woohyun steps in the door and grabs him by the collar, dragging him off towards their room. Woohyun trips over the mass of shoes that clog the entryway and almost goes down, but he manages to right himself, which is a good thing, because Sunggyu doesn’t pause for a second, and if he’d actually fallen Sunggyu would probably just pull him along on his back. Woohyun barely has time to take in the wide-eyed gazes of the other guys as they pass them in the living room before Sunggyu slings him into their bedroom and throws the door shut behind them.

He rounds on Woohyun, voice low and intense. “What. Did you do?”

Sunggyu is really terrifying when he’s angry, and if Woohyun didn’t feel lower than something crusted to the bottom of a dumpster, he’d probably be scared or at least nervous. As it is, he’s just so _tired_ , so worn down by self-loathing that it’s all he can do to shake his head. 

Sunggyu throws his hands up in the air. “You know what? I don’t even need you to tell me. I _know_ what you did. You came on to him, didn’t you?”

Woohyun’s voice is barely above a whisper when he answers, not because he’s trying to keep quiet but because that’s all the energy he can spare. “…I kissed him.”

“You complete _idiot_!” Sunggyu is steaming, for all he’s not being very loud, and he looks like he might actually hurt Woohyun. Honestly, Woohyun would welcome it. He _deserves_ it. He knows that. “How could you be so _stupid_?”

“I don’t know, I don’t know!” Woohyun says helplessly, his eyes burning, feeling like he’s going to start crying at any moment. God, he hates himself.

“I thought you of all people would be able to keep your head together! I trusted you with him—“ Sunggyu doesn’t even pause at how Woohyun flinches at the word ‘trust.’ “—I totally believed that you would take care of him! I left it to you because I knew you’d treat him like himself! And now _this_? You have never let me down the way you have now, Nam Woohyun.”

Woohyun hadn’t thought that anything could make him feel worse than he has since Sungyeol ran away from him, but knowing that he’s let his leader down—Sunggyu, who he respects more than anyone else in the world—just makes him sink lower. 

“I didn’t—I didn’t do it because he’s a girl,” he mutters, closing his eyes and pressing his fists against them. “I did it because I wanted to kiss _him_.” 

Sunggyu shakes his head in incredulity. “It doesn’t _matter_ —do you really think that matters at _all_? _He doesn’t believe that_. Even if you tell him, he isn’t going to believe that. He might never forgive you, Woohyun, and I don’t blame him at all.”

Sunggyu is such a _bastard_. Does he really think Woohyun needs to hear that? Does he really think Woohyun doesn’t _already know that_ , that he hasn’t been lashing himself with it for the past hour? “I know that!” he explodes, and he’s shaking, but if he’s honest with himself, he knows it isn’t from fury, or at least not at Sunggyu. “You think I don’t know that? I know that I’m a piece of shit! I know I’ve ruined everything! I know how bad I hurt him!”

“Yeah, you have,” Sunggyu confirms with hard eyes, not at all cowed by the force of Woohyun’s emotions. “What you did was inexcusable. Do you have any idea of how this could affect Infinite?”

There it is. Woohyun has been waiting for that since the beginning. Of course it comes down to Infinite, because it always does. He and Sunggyu have always been of one myopic mind about Infinite; even back when Sunggyu couldn’t stand him, they’d forged an alliance out of mutual respect for each others’ hard work and their combined absolute commitment to what they wanted Infinite to be—everything they knew it _could_ be, everything they knew they could make it. When it’s him and Sunggyu, it’s always, always going to be about Infinite.

And so there’s nothing to say. Because Woohyun does indeed know how this could affect Infinite, how the rift between him and Sungyeol could poison the whole group, how—

He knows. So he stands there in silence, head bowed as he listens to Sunggyu breathing so hard in his anger. 

After what feels like a very long time, he quietly asks, “How did you know?” 

The question stirs Sunggyu out of his furious contemplation and Woohyun doesn’t have to be looking at him to know that his eyes have narrowed even more than usual. “He called me. _He_ called _me_. He said he wasn’t coming back to the dorm till he’s himself again.”

Woohyun’s head flies up in alarm. “What? Where is he? Where is he now?”

“He’ll be staying a hotel for a while. Hyoan-hyung left just before you did with some stuff that his girlfriend is going to take to him.”

Woohyun thinks of Sungyeol moping around in a hotel room by himself, far away from the members and the dorms and _no_. And that’s when he sees Sunggyu’s phone lying on the bed.

Sunggyu, being Sunggyu, follows his gaze and launches himself forward only a split second after Woohyun does, and then the phone is in Woohyun’s hand, but Sunggyu isn’t going to let it go that easily, and they’re struggling, Sunggyu trying to yank the phone away from him, Woohyun holding on like a lifeline.

“Nam Woohyun, give me my phone _now_!”

“No! He won’t answer when I call him, no matter how many times I call!”

“Of course he won’t, you ass! He doesn’t want to talk to you, and who could blame him?”

“I _have_ to talk to him, hyung, I have to!”

For all his old man image, Sunggyu is really strong. Woohyun works out more, but Sunggyu is a bit larger, not to mention one of the most stubborn people Woohyun knows, and he clearly isn’t about to surrender his phone easily. But Woohyun is a fighter when he wants to be, when it’s something he cares about, and he’s not sure he’s ever cared about anything quite as much as he does about this. Well, maybe Infinite. But only Infinite.

They’ve fallen to their knees, still fighting each other for the phone, when the door flies open. “What’s going on? Why are you fighting?” Dongwoo demands, voice concerned, eyes huge. 

Sunggyu just barely gives him a glance, but that half-second of distraction is all the time Woohyun needs, and he wrenches the phone away, stumbling to his feet and running headlong out the door and into the bathroom, slamming and locking the door behind him. It’s barely closed when he hears Sunggyu pounding on the outside. “Leave him _alone_ , Woohyun! You don’t deserve to talk to him right now, do you hear me?”

“I know,” Woohyun mutters. “I know I don’t.” He types in different passwords for a few moments, face screwing up with concentration.

“You broke one of the unbreakable rules, Woohyun!” Sunggyu’s voice is loud even through the door. “Not only am I going to hand your ass to you for skipping out on schedules today, I’m also going to make sure you regret ever touching my phone!”

Woohyun ignores him; he knows he should feel guilty for breaking one of the few rules that allows them any sort of privacy in their lives—the ‘don’t touch someone else’s phone without permission’ rule—and he’s never even considered doing it before because he respects that rule and all it symbolizes, but right now he’s desperate. Right now he’ll try anything.

By the time Woohyun finally hacks into the phone (he should have known the password was a Nell reference—can Sunggyu get any more obvious?), Sunggyu has stopped pounding and is outlining in frightening detail just how he’s going to punish Woohyun, but Woohyun doesn’t even hear him, not when his hands are shaking as he finds Sungyeol’s number in the contact list. Woohyun clutches the phone too tight as he listens to the ring—and another ring—and another. 

Somehow the voice that answers sounds both exactly and nothing like Sungyeol’s, and it makes Woohyun feel like his heart has been plucked right out of his chest. “Hyung?”

“Sungyeol, don’t hang up, please, I’m begging you!” Woohyun yells into the phone.

“Go to hell, Nam,” Sungyeol growls, and if Woohyun weren’t about to throw up all over the phone, he’d probably find it endearing, the way that growl sounds in Sungyeol’s feminine voice. He just _knows_ Sungyeol is about to hang up on him, so he shouts out the first thing that enters his head.

“I’ll wear a bathrobe to the airport!”

There’s a pause, and Woohyun can almost picture Sungyeol’s thumb hesitating over the end call option. 

Not sure whether he’s giddy or terrified, but knowing that he can feel every drop of blood thrumming through his veins, Woohyun keeps talking. “Or—or anything! Anything you want, you can pick it out, and I swear I’ll wear it, no matter how ridiculous or ugly or embarrassing, I’ll wear it, and I won’t tell anyone it was because of a dare, I’ll make sure they think I picked it out myself!”

There’s silence from the other end, and Woohyun holds his breath, hoping Sungyeol will understand that Woohyun is putting his pride in Sungyeol’s hands, understand everything behind this gesture. _I wouldn’t do that for anyone. I’d do it for Infinite, if Infinite needed it. And I’d do it for you, to get you to talk to me. But that’s it._

After a moment in which Woohyun thinks his veins might actually explode from the force with which his blood is pumping through them, a perfectly emotionless voice asks, “What do you want?”

Chills race across Woohyun’s skin; he’s never heard Sungyeol’s usually expressive voice so perfectly flat. But it’s the opening he needs. “Let me talk to you. Please. Let me explain.”

“What’s there to explain? I figured it out myself,” Sungyeol says in that same flat voice.

“No, no, you didn’t, Sungyeol, I swear it’s not what you think.” Woohyun thinks that Sunggyu’s phone is dangerously close to cracking right in half in his hand, but he doesn’t care—he’ll buy Sunggyu a new one if need be. “I _know_ what you must think of me right now and I don’t blame you, I’d think the same thing—I’d _hate_ me—but there are things you don’t know, and I need to tell you. Please. Just let me talk to you.”

How silence can actually be stony, Woohyun has never understood, but this certainly is, hard and rigid and maybe sharp around the edges, too. It presses into Woohyun as he waits, cuts into him. 

“I swear I won’t touch you. I won’t even look at you if you don’t want me to, I’ll stay on the other side of the door or something. But please, please, just let me talk to you.”

More silence, more crushing pressure, more slicing. And then: “Fine.” And the call is over.

Woohyun drops to his knees, wanting to bury his face in his lap and sob with relief. But he just takes a brief moment to take this in, then he’s scrambling to his feet and throwing the door open.

Sunggyu is standing on the other side, arms crossed and scowling, and a worried-looking Dongwoo is clinging to Myungsoo’s arm as the other members stand around.

“Where is he, hyung?” Woohyun demands. 

“You can’t honestly think I’d tell you that, not with what you’ve pulled.” Sunggyu shakes his head as though he hadn’t expected any other question.

“Hyung, I swear, when I get back you can punish me however you like, I know I deserve it, I’ll take anything and I won’t complain.”

“You’ve been making a lot of promises, Nam Woohyun.”

So Sunggyu was listening through the door. Of course he was. “And I’m going to keep all of them,” Woohyun assures him. _I am._ “But he said he’d listen, and I can’t let him think that I’d—“ He cuts off abruptly. “I _have_ to explain. You’re right that I don’t deserve to, but _he_ deserves to hear the truth. You know he does.”

Sunggyu looks away; the other members just wait in silence with various looks of confusion on their faces; Woohyun knows as soon as this conversation is over they’re going to tear Sunggyu apart asking questions. But he doesn’t move his eyes from Sunggyu’s face, waiting for his leader to deliver his verdict. “Infinite’s Woohyun can’t be seen going into a hotel,” Sunggyu says finally. 

Woohyun feels like dancing, and maybe he’s squirming a little bit with impatient excitement. “Kibum isn’t my best friend for nothing, hyung, I know how to sneak into places without getting caught. No one will see me.”

“You swear?” Sunggyu asks wryly.

Woohyun hears his sarcasm, but he doesn’t care. “I swear,” he nods emphatically. “No one will see me, and I’ll leave as soon as Sungyeol tells me to.”

Sunggyu makes him wait so much longer than anyone else would, but eventually he cracks. “If I get a call from him and he’s upset, _I_ swear to God I will come over there and drag you away myself.”

Woohyun wants to throw himself at Sunggyu’s feet and thank him, but he knows that would only piss Sunggyu off, so he stays where he is. “ _Thank you_ , hyung.”

A minute later, he’s barrelling through the front door, the name and address of the hotel echoing in his head, already mentally mapping out ways of getting past the fans outside the dorm without being seen and then into the hotel without arousing suspicion. He can do this perfectly. He has to. For Infinite and for Sungyeol.

 

 

The knock, when it comes, is quiet, almost tentative, without even the slightest bit of Woohyun’s usual enthusiasm, but Sungyeol isn’t impressed. He crosses his arms over his chest, glaring at the door as though Woohyun will be able to feel his disdain through the heavy wood. He still isn’t sure why he agreed to let Woohyun come at all; the last thing he wants right now is to talk to him. When he’d run away from him a couple of hours ago, Sungyeol had been sure that he _never_ wanted to see Nam Woohyun again. In his fury—he isn’t ready to admit just yet that it was hurt, too, but he knows it was—he’d even thought it might be better if he stays a girl, because if he does, he won’t have to go back to Infinite and he might actually be able to avoid Woohyun forever. 

That was a stupid thought, and he knows it—he doesn’t really want that, not at all—but he’s been feeling as though every inch of his skin has been ripped away and everything below is laid raw and open and bare to the world. He hates the way he feels; he isn’t _supposed_ to feel this way, isn’t supposed to be able to be this hurt—yes, hurt—by something someone else does, and he’s tried to tell himself it’s because he’s a girl right now, but he knows that isn’t true. Woohyun had hurt _him_ , had hurt Lee Sungyeol in a way that has nothing to do with the body he’s currently stuck in, and Sungyeol thinks even if he added up every rejection from every casting director who’s ever told him that he’s not ‘right’ for a part, every snide question from a fan or an interviewer about what he actually contributes to Infinite, every moment of watching the other members get the opportunities he’d sell his soul for—even if he combined all of them, it wouldn’t hurt quite as much as having Woohyun betray him like that. 

Because Woohyun is his friend, one of his very best friends, and more than that, he’s one of the few people Sungyeol feels completely at ease around. Woohyun may laugh at him, may tease him, but Woohyun never thinks he’s less than, never looks down on him—even if he has a right to, with his voice and his abs and his getting-handed-drama-roles. Sungyeol has spent more time than he’d ever admit to (even to himself) thinking about the message Woohyun had left him on twitter for his birthday: _oh and.. you’re not a failed character so don’t worry about it - I love you forever, forever_. He hates that his lack of confidence is so apparent to Woohyun, but the thing is: he knows Woohyun means that. Woohyun _doesn’t_ think he’s a failed character, Woohyun actually means he’ll love him no matter what, that they’ll always be friends, that Woohyun _wants_ to be his friend no matter what, not just because they’re bandmates but because they’re _them_. Or at least that’s what Sungyeol had thought. 

So having Woohyun treat him like just a body, not like Lee Sungyeol, his friend, feels like a betrayal of something so deep Sungyeol hadn’t even noticed it was there. And Sungyeol hadn’t seen it coming. 

He’d run until his flip-flops threatened to rip apart right on his feet, and then he’d collapsed onto a bench at a park, curling up into himself and not crying. His eyes had burned, but no tears had fallen, and for that, at least, Sungyeol was fiercely grateful: he wasn’t going to turn into a weepy girl just because he’s in a girl’s body. After a long time of staring at nothing and trying not to think, he’d fumbled in his pocket for his phone, called Sunggyu, and informed him that he wouldn’t be coming back to the dorm until he was back to himself again. Sunggyu had been concerned (Sunggyu might not be Sungyeol’s biggest fan, but he does _care_ and if it’s only because of Infinite, well, Infinite is their world so that doesn’t make any difference), but he’s still Sunggyu, so he hadn’t pushed it, just agreeing and telling him he’d take care of it. Twenty minutes later, he called Sungyeol back with the name of a hotel and a plan to get his things to him, and Sungyeol had dragged himself into a taxi and then inside the hotel—nice but not luxurious—to check in.

He’s been in the room for a while now, sometimes pacing, sometimes flopping on the bed, sometimes flipping through TV channels without really seeing anything on them. He’s been feeling so many emotions that he feels like they’re going to force him right out of his skin, that his body—this body, any body—isn’t big enough to hold them. 

And that was all before Woohyun had called. On Sunggyu’s _phone_ , the bastard, and Sungyeol knows Sunggyu wouldn’t have given it to him, which means that Woohyun took it without permission, which means Woohyun is going to be in even bigger trouble with Sunggyu than he already was for skipping vocal practice. That wasn’t enough to keep Sungyeol from hanging up on him, though, which he intended to do—as soon as he heard Woohyun’s voice, he hadn’t even considered anything else. But then Woohyun had said the most unexpected thing of all, and somehow…somehow the desperateness behind that stupid gesture had snagged on something inside Sungyeol till he found himself agreeing to something he’d sworn moments before never to do.

And now Woohyun is here, just outside the door. Waiting.

And, yeah, Sungyeol is going to make him wait. He’ll see if drawing this out makes Woohyun start pounding at the door or something, giving Sungyeol another reason to be annoyed with him when he opens the door (not that he needs another, but any reminder that Woohyun is the world’s biggest asshole is welcome). Sungyeol gnaws on his fingernail for a while, waiting for the knock to come again, but it doesn’t. _Did he actually go away?_ he wonders, biting until he gets too antsy to stand still, and then he pads over to the door and peeks out the peephole. Woohyun is still there, though all Sungyeol can see is the top of his head since it’s bent, his hands crossed in front of him. He looks like a penitent, and Sungyeol snorts. Like that’s going to win him over.

After a moment he sighs and rolls his eyes, throwing up the door. Woohyun’s head shoots up, a hopeful, almost broken look on his face, but Sungyeol just stares at him, unimpressed. At least on the outside.

Woohyun looks—terrible. Sungyeol has seen him wasted down to almost nothing by too much stress, too much work, too much trying-to-make-other-people-happy, too little food, too little sleep, too little time to remember who he really is. He’s seen him when he looks like he might work himself to death, when Sungyeol had honestly been scared for his life. But right now, he looks worse than Sungyeol has ever seen him.

It makes Sungyeol feel…satisfied. The feeling is small and smug and even a little bit gloating, and he knows he should be ashamed of it, but he’s not. He’s really, really not. _Not after you treated me like that, Nam Woohyun._

He stands there glaring at Woohyun in silence for so long that Woohyun drops his head again, looking down at his shoes. But Sungyeol isn’t going to crack first. He may be impulsive, but he can be damn stubborn when he wants to be. He’s going to _make_ Woohyun crack first. 

Finally one of Woohyun’s feet twitches and he ducks his head, then looks up again. “Hi,” he says, and his voice is so quiet, so not-Woohyun that Sungyeol almost feels a pang of sympathy for him.

Almost.

That hi isn’t enough, though—seriously? _Hi_?—so he just waits. He wishes he had eyebrows to arc, but since he doesn’t, arms crossed over his chest will work. 

“Can I—can I come in?” Woohyun’s voice tilts up hesitantly at the end of the question, and Sungyeol has never heard him sound so tentative. Good. “Or are we going to—out here—“

“Anybody could walk by, you dumbass, and you’ve taken your mask off,” Sungyeol snaps, pointing at the mask Woohyun is crumpling in his hand. And then he spins on his heel—he bets it looks really dramatic in a girl’s body, especially with the skirt flaring (no wonder girls like skirts)—and stomps back into the room, not at all concerned with the fact that the weighted door swings shut behind him. It would serve Woohyun right if it smacked him right in his obnoxious face and broke his stupidly pointy nose or something. Let’s see him grease _then_. 

But he hears the sound of Woohyun catching the door, so his hopes are thwarted, and then it quietly clicking shut, so Woohyun must have been overly careful about closing it. Jackass. 

Sungyeol strides over to the one chair in the room, throwing himself into it and settling himself before crossing his arms again, ready to wait again.

Sungyeol watches with narrowed eyes as Woohyun glances at the bed, the only other available seating in the room, but he doesn’t make a move towards it. So he’s going to stand then. Sungyeol hopes his legs hurt. He also halfway hopes he’ll come closer so Sungyeol can yell at him to get the fuck away, but he doesn’t, just standing by the door to the bathroom, face drawn and quiet. Sungyeol looks away disinterestedly, staring at the ugly framed print over the bed. _Whenever you get the courage, pansyass._

“Yeol, I know what you must be thinking,” he starts after a moment, but Sungyeol is having none of that.

“Yeah? Well, why do you tell me, then, since you can obviously read my mind.”

Woohyun’s lips part, but then he presses them together again, hard, before grimacing. “You think I’m the biggest jerk on the planet.”

“Well, that isn’t the word I’d choose, but yeah, something like that.”

“I don’t blame you,” Woohyun hurries on, ignoring Sungyeol’s dry tone. “I know it must have looked like I was…just treating you nicely from the beginning just so I could come onto you later, but I swear that wasn’t what it was.”

Sungyeol rolls his eyes; he’s been ready for this. “Let me guess: you just got caught up in the moment and you did it without thinking.”

Woohyun’s lips twitch, which looks epically stupid with lips as fat as his. “I did, but that’s not—“

“So Infinite’s Woohyun doesn’t have any self-control. Good to know. We’ll have to make sure to keep him far away from the girl groups, if he can’t keep his lips off of any attractive girl he’s around—“

“It wasn’t an attractive girl, it was you!”

Sungyeol could almost swear he hears Woohyun’s shout echo in the silence after his mouth closes, but that isn’t possible, not in a room like this. For a moment Sungyeol doesn’t think of anything at all because that sentence didn’t make sense, but then his quick brain starts to assemble things, creating an order to those seemingly nonsensical words. And once it does, he just gets madder, shooting up out of his seat as the meaning comes to him. “Oh, so that makes it _better_ , does it? You thought that since your bandmate suddenly has a pussy, then _of course_ he must be cool with fooling around?” 

Woohyun looks so tense he might shatter, every muscle in his body ratcheted to the snapping point, but his voice is as desperate as it is loud. “You’re not just my bandmate, but that’s not what I’m saying at all!”

Sungyeol’s fingernails—cut just as short as they are when he’s in his real body, because it’s too much trouble otherwise—are digging into his palms as he glares at him. “What are you saying then?” he shouts back. 

“I’m saying I wanted to kiss _you_!”

There’s a heartbeat of silence, and then Sungyeol scoffs (he clings to disgust because he can’t acknowledge that Woohyun can hurt him even more than he already has); he honestly didn’t believe Woohyun would sink this low. He’d honestly thought Woohyun was _better_ than this. God, he’s such a fucking idiot. “You really expect me to believe that?” His voice is strained, his vocal chords ache like they do after he’s been in vocal practice for hours and hours on end. “You think you can lie to me like that just to smooth things over and then I’ll be taken in and forgive you?”

“I’m not _ly_ —“

Sungyeol’s anger is so thick it almost covers his hurt, and the force of it propels him on. “You think that’s going to make me swoon or something? Make me forget how much of a dick you are that you would do that to one of your friends?” Just saying the word ‘friend’ hurts so much; he’d been so sure that that’s what he and Woohyun were, that Woohyun really _likes_ him and doesn’t think of him as just a coworker. But he sees now exactly how little respect Woohyun has for him. “‘Oh, it has nothing to do with your gender, Sungyeol,’” Sungyeol imitates in a whiny voice, and so what if it doesn’t sound anything like Woohyun? “‘I see the _real_ you!’”

Woohyun is red now, cheeks flushed, and it can’t be in embarrassment or anger or anything else that usually makes someone’s color change, so Sungyeol doesn’t know what it is. “I _do_! It _is_ you I see when I look at you! Whatever body you’re in doesn’t have anything to do with it!” 

Sungyeol laughs, and there isn’t anything happy in the sound at all, not even anything amused. “Yeah, because you totally would have kissed me right then if I was me.”

“I _would_ have!”

Rage sweeps over Sungyeol in a cloud so thick he almost chokes on it, and his fist flies out before he can even think about it. His aim’s not very good—whether because of the body he’s still not quite used to or because he’s so angry he’s trembling—so it lands right beside Woohyun’s eye, right against the bone. Woohyun’s head flies back, his mouth gaping open in surprise, and Sungyeol shrieks and jerks his hand back to him—that _hurt_ , and he hadn’t even hit him with that full of force.

There’s silence as Woohyun’s hand steals up to the side of his face as though he can’t quite believe what just happened, and Sungyeol shakes his own hand and then cradles it to himself, trying to ignore the pain and the tears that have sprung up in his eyes. (The tears are from the pain in his hand. That’s what they’re from.)

When he finally controls himself enough to speak, Sungyeol’s voice is low and intense, squeezing out between the emotions clogging his throat. “Get your fucking lying mouth out of this room. _Now_.” 

Woohyun shakes his head, not in disagreement, to clear it probably, but that doesn’t mean it pisses Sungyeol off any less. “Sungyeol—“

Sungyeol finds that his own head is shaking in incredulity; he cannot believe it’s come to this. “So that’s how little you think of me. That you would lie to me like that and think I would believe it. That I’m that big of an idiot, or that I’m that desperate for compliments or something. You think I’m that _pathetic_.” His throat feels like it’s closing up, but he can still spit the last word.

Woohyun holds his hands out as if in appeal, and even though they’re nowhere close enough to touch him, Sungyeol jerks back. “Sungyeol, no. No. Maybe you’re right that I wouldn’t have done it in public if you were a guy, I got to feeling too comfortable and—“

“Did you not hear what I said? I told you to get out. Or do you not have to listen to me because I’m not a person, I’m a girl?”

Woohyun’s face goes completely blank, but his little intake of breath is sharp. His lips part, though the rest of him remains almost unnaturally still for just a moment, and then he rushes towards the door, hurling it open and himself out of it. 

But then before Sungyeol can even feel satisfied, Woohyun turns to face him and throws himself down on his knees there on the carpeted floor of the hall and bows his head towards the ground. 

There’s dead silence, the only sound the thud of the door as it swings back and slams into Woohyun’s side, but Woohyun doesn’t even flinch, though the door is heavy enough that it had to have hurt. Sungyeol stands frozen, staring at his friend on his knees in front of him but outside of the room, but Woohyun doesn’t move. Sungyeol can see his hands clenched into fists, the veins standing out along the top, and Infinite is known for its pretty hands, but Woohyun’s aren’t like Sungyeol’s or Sunggyu’s. They’re a bit boxier, more masculine, and really not pretty at all. Sungyeol’s head feels like it’s going to roll off his shoulders. 

“What the fuck are you doing?” Sungyeol rasps finally, because how can he not?

Woohyun doesn’t raise his head from where his forehead is practically touching the ground, but his voice is just loud enough for Sungyeol to hear. “I swear to God, Sungyeol—no. No, no: I swear on Infinite.” He looks up then, and Sungyeol has never seen his face like this before. He doesn’t even know how to label it, what he’s seeing on Woohyun’s face, but it’s something like honesty and something like desperation and something like pleading and something like something Sungyeol has never seen directed at himself before so he doesn’t even know what it is. “I swear on Infinite, I kissed you because I wanted to kiss _you_.”

Sungyeol can’t keep looking at that face. He can’t. So he looks away. Woohyun would never swear on Infinite if he weren’t totally honest, Sungyeol knows that. Or at least if he didn’t _think_ he was being honest. “You may have convinced yourself of that, but—“

“No.” Woohyun’s voice isn’t raised at all, but it’s so sure without being hard at all. “I know it’s the truth, because I want to kiss you when you’re a guy, too.”

There is…there is no way to react to that. None at all. The laugh Sungyeol lets out is breathy and half-formed, but what else is he going to do? What—

_What_?

His lips form the word, no sound coming out, though Woohyun doesn’t seem to have needed the prompt. He’s up on his knees now, and he’s saying things and—

“I have thought about kissing you so many times, Sungyeol, you can’t even imagine, you don’t even know how much I’ve wanted to. For—for _months_ now—God, there are days when I feel like the only thing I actually think about the whole day is your mouth, and I’ve killed myself trying to stop it, but I just can’t _help_ it when you’re—when you’re laughing and you’re saying these ridiculous witty things and you’re trying so hard in the studio and you’re making the fans smile and you’re drinking too much fucking coffee and you’re rolling your eyes when Sunggyu-hyung talks and you’re—and you’re _you_ , and you’re right, if you were still in your own body I would never have let myself kiss you in public that way because it’s public and no one can ever know, I couldn’t do that to you and to Infinite, but I _swear_ , Sungyeol, I swear that it wasn’t about you being a girl, it’s never been about that, it’s not about whether you’re a guy, either, it’s about _you_ and—“

Those—those _words_ only stop when Sungyeol is suddenly beside him, thin hands wrapped around his arm and jerking him to his feet, and Woohyun’s mouth (Woohyun’s mouth with the bee-stung lips and the words he keeps saying like they’re things that can exist in the universe, the mouth that had kissed Sungyeol’s just a few hours ago) stutters to a stop, his eyes blinking up at Sungyeol but letting Sungyeol yank him into the room. “Wha—“

“You can’t do this in the _hall_ , you fucking idiot,” Sungyeol hisses, and so what if his hands are shaking, so what? “What if someone walks by, what the fuck are you thinking, what will you do when the websites are all talking tomorrow about Infinite’s Woohyun in a hallway in a hotel on his knees and—“

The door slams behind them and Woohyun jerks back. It’s so abrupt that Sungyeol flinches at it; why is Woohyun pulling away from him like that when he just said those _things_ —

“I swore I wouldn’t touch you,” Woohyun says, and his eyes are a bit dazed. _His_ eyes are a little bit dazed. Sungyeol just sort of stares at him, but apparently Woohyun doesn’t know how to shut up because he starts babbling again. “I’m sorry, Sungyeol, I’m sorry about kissing you and I’m sorry that I even want to and I’m sorry about the bathroom the other day and I’m sorry that this is happening to you and I know you’re probably disgusted with me right now and this will make it hard for you to be bandmates with me, but I swear I’ll keep fighting it, I swear I will, and I’ll stay away from you, too, I won’t make you uncomfortable, I’ll try to think of something else, I’ll try _so hard_ , Sungyeol, you have no idea how hard I’ll try, I’ll do anything you need me to do so that it doesn’t make you uncomfortable, anything, I—“

“Just shut up!”

Woohyun’s mouth snaps shut and his eyebrows fly up in shock at Sungyeol’s shout. Sungyeol’s hands are still shaking, and he bunches his skirt in them to try to _stop_ them. “Just—just be quiet for five minutes, you dick, I need to think.”

Sungyeol turns his back on him, not able to look at him right now, and stumbles over to the far wall to lean his forehead against it, hands crushing his skirt into wrinkles. He reminds himself to breathe, first sucking in air and letting it out with his mouth open, then remembering that he can do it through his nose, too, and closing his mouth to try that. Okay. Okay. 

When Sungyeol finally spins back around, Woohyun is standing there with a lost look on his face, like a kid who wandered away from mom at a department store. He looks really—young.

“So what you’re saying is,” Sungyeol says, and he realizes his voice is too loud, strained, so he lowers it a bit. “That you like me.”

Woohyun fish-mouths for a moment. “I—yeah.” And then he laughs, a weird little laugh, and later Woohyun will tell him it’s because it was so absurd to use a word like ‘like,’ that it just seems stupidly small, but right now the laugh is just strange. “Yeah. I like you.”

“You _like_ me,” Sungyeol repeats, and it isn’t clear from his tone—or in his mind—whether it’s a question or not.

“I—yes, Sungyeol, I just said I did!”

“So you want to like,” Sungyeol cocks his head to the side, not even noticing the way his hair falls over his shoulder. “Be my boyfriend and stuff?”

Woohyun gapes at him again, then looks away. “I’m not—I’m not asking you for anything. I know you don’t—and that’s okay, I would never, _never_ pressure you for anything and—“

“But if you could, you’d want to be my boyfriend,” Sungyeol interrupts, tone not changing.

“What’re you—fine, yes, okay! If you’d let me, I’d want to be your boyfriend!”

“Even when I’m a guy.”

“For fuck’s sake, Sungyeol, yes, even when you’re a guy!” Woohyun is so impatient now, and Sungyeol knows he should be pissed at him—what right does he have to be impatient with Sungyeol? After everything he’s done and said today? _Sungyeol_ is the one who’s allowed to be impatient and angry and annoyed—but his mind is so blank of emotions that he isn’t. 

The blankness is making his legs feel a little uncertain underneath him, so he walks over to the bed and sits down on it. Okay. Okay.

“So…you’ve wanted to kiss me for a long time.”

Woohyun makes a choking sound but doesn’t say anything else, his eyes wide.

“And you also want to…have sex with me. And stuff.”

Woohyun, standing awkwardly not far away, turns so red Sungyeol thinks he might burst a blood vessel. “Are you trying to _embarrass_ me now? Shame me out of it? Because I’ve already tried that, reminding myself of what people think about—about—about people like me, and it hasn’t worked.”

“Like, suck me off,” Sungyeol continues. “And stick your dick up my ass. Or mine up yours—“ Sungyeol head flies up so he can look at him. “Which do you like?”

Woohyun’s face has left red behind and now is in full-on purple territory. “Sungyeol,” he asks in a strangled voice. “Why are you doing this? I—I said I’m sorry.”

“And then you want to cuddle or whatever? And have anniversaries and go on dates and—hey, was today a date? I didn’t think about it at the time, but it kind of seems like it was a date.”

Woohyun looks like he’s trying to curl into himself, Sungyeol notes absently, and his voice is still strangled when he talks. “I know sorry isn’t good enough, I know it isn’t, but you don’t have to—you don’t have to punish me like _this_ or whatever it is you’re doing—what Sunggyu comes up with will be enough—“

“I haven’t been on a date in forever, but it was a pretty good one, at least except for that jackass who wouldn’t leave me alone and the way it ended.” A pause. “Hey. Hey, come here.”

Woohyun hesitates for a moment, his eyes wide with anxiety, but then he stumbles forward as though Sungyeol is yanking him towards him with a rope, looking like he’d rather run away. “What—?”

Sungyeol pulls him to sit down on the bed beside him, then looks at his face. It’s a unique face, with that unexpected nose and lips that are fuller than anyone’s have a right to be. It changes a lot, that face, depending on what weight Woohyun is at at the moment—he fluctuates so much, and Sungyeol knows it’s because his body resists the way Woohyun wants it to be, but Woohyun is just so damn stubborn and fucking committed to making the fangirls happy that he forces it to obey him anyway, at least for a while till it rebels again. Woohyun has said multiple times that he doesn’t look like an idol, which Sungyeol thinks is a little ridiculous, since none of them really look like an idol except Sungjong. Even Myungsoo’s handsomeness isn’t really idol handsomeness. But who cares? Girls still think they’re all hot, even Sunggyu, which has never made any sense to Sungyeol at all. But maybe they especially like Woohyun and maybe some of them notice, too, the way the definition of his face changes as his body does.

“Sungyeol, what are you doing?” Woohyun asks, and his voice and eyes are…scared. Sungyeol’s always liked his eyes, as much as he likes any feature on another guy’s face. 

“I didn’t get a chance to—“ Sungyeol says distantly, “—earlier, it was over so fast—“

Sungyeol’s lips barely brush against Woohyun’s before Woohyun is jerking back so quickly he almost falls off the bed. “What the fuck are you _doing_ , Sungyeol?” Now his eyes and voice sound like he’s about to start crying. 

“I told you. I didn’t get a chance to see what kissing you is really like.” It’s not something Sungyeol has ever really thought about, kissing a guy—well, there was the thing with Sungjong, but that was for the fans and it didn’t count, and neither did the pepero game with Myungsoo: just pressing your lips against someone’s isn’t really a kiss, there has to be some sort of intention behind it.

“Sungyeol,” Woohyun chokes, and his eyes are glassy. “Why are you doing this?”

Sungyeol leans forward again, but once again Woohyun pulls back violently. “I promised I wouldn’t touch you,” Woohyun says desperately, and there are definitely tears in his eyes now, and he sounds scared or miserable or something. Idiot.

“Well, that was a stupid thing to promise, wasn’t it?” Sungyeol says, and then he’s kissing Woohyun.

It’s different than anyone he’s kissed before, but he’s in a different body now, and more than that he knows that each person you kiss is a little different from all the others. It’s not _drastically_ different, like he would have thought kissing a guy would be, if he’d ever taken the time to think about it. Sure, Woohyun smells more masculine, but his lips are just lips—abnormally full lips that are actually really nice against Sungyeol’s own, but lips all the same. 

It’s also different because Woohyun doesn’t kiss him back. He’s clearly trying so hard to hold himself so still, but he’s trembling despite that. Sungyeol’s doing the best he can with the kiss, exploring this new territory, but it’s really just not the same when he’s the only one actually doing anything. So he presses his tongue against the seam of Woohyun’s lips, and Woohyun trembles harder and resists him, his breathing ragged through his nose, but after a moment he parts them with this intense little sigh that makes shivers that are hot instead of cold slither up Sungyeol’s back, and when Sungyeol’s tongue touches his, he makes this helpless little _whimper_ that Sungyeol swears he can feel between his legs. 

Sungyeol kisses him long and slow, feeling Woohyun shake against him, feeling heat unfurling inside him—not very intense, but there. And when he finally pulls back, Woohyun’s eyes are screwed up tight, and it takes them a moment to open, and when they do, they’re still wet. 

“Sungyeol.” Woohyun’s voice is so, so miserable. “ _Why_?”

“Hey,” Sungyeol says. “Let’s try this.”


	5. Chapter 5

Woohyun is pretty used to Sungyeol surprising him. Surprise is almost what Sungyeol _does_. Sungyeol is impulsive and unflinchingly honest and his brain works in ways no one else’s ever has. Add to that a love of life, a mischievous streak, and a complete disregard for authority, and Sungyeol is a hurricane. Woohyun has often thought that that’s why their CEO decided Sungyeol belonged with them—because they needed someone to keep them from becoming stagnant or grim, from being so absorbed in work that their fans can’t see their human side. Sungyeol is the shot of adrenaline their image needs, a reminder that they’re real people, and maybe Woohyun is just too gone over him, but he thinks maybe Sungyeol is one of the reasons people love Infinite so much.

So Woohyun has mostly just gone with whatever Sungyeol throws at him, often letting himself be pulled along into his romping. He’s learned to take the surprises as they come, and maybe it’s that very tendency of Sungyeol’s to make life so much more exciting than it would be otherwise that made Woohyun first start to fall for him. It could be.

But for all that, Woohyun has never, ever dreamed that Sungyeol could surprise him like _this_.

Not one thing about this encounter has gone the way Woohyun had expected it to. Well, okay, the name-calling was definitely something he saw coming—if anything, it was a lot more mild than what Woohyun had assumed it would be. And the punching was something he’d considered might happen, but he’d thought it would come as soon as he walked through the door, and when it didn’t he assumed it wasn’t going to happen at all, so when it finally did, he’d been caught off-guard. 

But other than that, none of this is anything like Woohyun expected. He hadn’t dreamed the way that Sungyeol would interpret the things he said ( _he thought I think he’s pathetic? How could he ever think that?_ ), had never imagined he’d end up on his knees on the floor, never could have guessed Sungyeol would say all those things about how Woohyun feels about him.

And he never, ever, ever though than Sungyeol would kiss him. And then say—and then say _that_.

The kiss had—it had _hurt_. It was the sweetest thing Woohyun’s ever felt, but the pain of it was so exquisite he’s still not sure how he’s managed not break down into sobs. He’d never known it was possible to want to run away that badly—but also to want a moment to last forever. It had been everything Woohyun’s wanted for so long now—Sungyeol kissing _him_ and with intent—but the only possible reason he could have been doing it is to torture Woohyun.

Woohyun’s always known that Sungyeol has a devious streak—he keeps it in check most of the time, but it’s definitely _there_ , peeking out in some of his more pointed comments—but he could never have guessed that even Sungyeol’s ingenious mind could come up with a punishment this twisted. 

Or at least he thought it was a punishment. He’d been so _sure_ while it was happening, but then Sungyeol said—and maybe that’s the next stage of the punishment, to flaunt in Woohyun’s face what he can’t have, to have Sungyeol treat him the way he’d treated Sungyeol—but there’s this tiny, tiny part of him that desperately, hungrily, pathetically hopes that he actually meant it. 

Sungyeol is looking at him with eyes Woohyun can’t read—there’s expectance there, but none of the rest of the things Woohyun is seeing make any _sense_ —waiting for Woohyun to say something.

But there’s only one thing Woohyun can say. “I don’t—I don’t understand.”

Sungyeol is blinking at him with those big, beautiful eyes, his face calm but intense as he seems to study him. “I think we should give this—“ he gestures between them. “—a try.”

He _wouldn’t_ be teasing him, would he? Even Sungyeol’s not that cruel. Is he? “But…but _why_?”

“I like you.” The words jolt through Woohyun even as he curses himself, reminding himself that that’s _not what Sungyeol meant_. “A lot. And I haven’t really thought about you like _that_ , but.” He shakes his head, and it’s only when his hair moves with the motion that Woohyun thinks about his body’s sex for the first time since Sungyeol opened the door. Through this whole thing it’s just seemed so…irrelevant, and even now Woohyun only notes it through a fog of other roiling emotions. “And you like me, and we have fun together, lots of fun. And we aren’t allowed to date—and even if we were, when would we find time to meet girls and actually do that? But you’re right here, always with me, and we could see what it’s like. Us together.”

Oh. Oh, he _is_ that cruel. But in a different way than Woohyun expected. “You’re saying you’re…settling for me?” He can hear his voice cracking, but he can’t stop it. “Because you can’t get a girl?” _Fuck_. 

“No, that’s not what I’m saying,” Sungyeol insists, and Woohyun almost believes him. Almost. “I mean….I like girls, a lot, I always have, and now that I’ve seen what they have to live with, I appreciate them even more. I’ve never really thought about guys like that—it didn’t occur to me to, not when there are so many girls in the world and I already _know_ I like them. And not when everyone seems to think it’s disgusting, guys liking each other. Why would I even ask if I could like a guy?”

“Yeol—“

“But now I’m asking, and the truth is, I don’t know. I don’t know if I could ever feel about a guy the way I do about girls. But I do know that I like being with you more than just about anybody. And I know that a relationship is mostly just…best friends who also are attracted to each other, right? And we’re pretty good at the friends thing, aren’t we?”

“Yeah. Yeah, we’re pretty good at it,” Woohyun chokes. How is he supposed to react to this? How is he supposed to understand this? And he’d thought Sungyeol waking up in a girl’s body was dizzying. 

“And I’ve always thought you were attractive in, like, an abstract way.” The matter-of-fact but thoughtful way Sungyeol says it makes Woohyun’s stomach twist up. “And I really liked kissing you just now.” _Fuck, Sungyeol. Why are you doing this to me?_ “Maybe that’s because I’m in this body, but would that really change me that much? I got turned on watching the girls dance earlier just like I would have in my real body—well, not just like, obviously—so it’s not like I’ve suddenly stopped liking girls because I am one. So I probably would like kissing you just as much if I were in my own body, right?”

What is he _saying_? “I don’t—“

“I don’t know, either. The only way we’d know is to wait till then. Except we don’t know if there’ll even _be_ a then. What if I’m like this forever? You still like me as much when I’m like this, right?”

Why is he talking about this now? Woohyun cannot keep up with this. “You’re not going to be stuck like this, that’s not going to happen, Sungyeol—“

Sungyeol ignores that. “But you still like me as a girl. That’s what you said.”

There’s nothing Woohyun can say to that except the truth. “I—yeah. That’s what I said,” he confirms helplessly.

“So what if… what if we see?” Sungyeol’s eyes are serious in a way they very rarely are, and it makes goosebumps break out on Woohyun’s skin. “What if we try and see if we’re good together? If you can…turn me on and stuff?”

Sungyeol’s explanations, his suggestions, they aren’t making anything better. And Woohyun absolutely will not think about _turning Sungyeol on holy shit why is he talking like this?_ “You want to experiment?” Woohyun asks, trying desperately not to show much this is hurting him. Because the thing is: he really doesn’t think Sungyeol is doing this _to_ hurt him. He really doesn’t think that it’s even occurred to Sungyeol at all that it _could_ hurt him. But that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t. “Using me to figure out if you can like guys? Is that with you’re saying?”

“No!” Outrageously, Sungyeol looks offended, almost hurt. “It wouldn’t be experimenting. God, what kind of a dick do you think I am? I wouldn’t do that to you. It would be real. It would be the whole…relationship thing.”

“But why would you want to be in a relationship with someone you don’t like?” Woohyun protests. 

“I do like you,” Sungyeol insists.

“Stop—stop saying that!” Woohyun didn’t even realize he was shooting to his feet, but now he finds he’s standing looking down at Sungyeol, and why does Sungyeol not understand how all of this _sounds_? “How you like me is nothing like how I like you, and you’re making it seem—seem _cheap_ or something. It’s not simple, Sungyeol, I’ve been dealing with this for a while now and it’s not something I decided to try out because I was curious or I thought it would be fun or something. Do you have any idea of how scary it is? And how freaked out I am? I thought you’d never want to be in the same room with me again if you found out and—fuck, think of what my parents would say! Think of what the _fans_ would say!”

“Yeah, the fans would probably call me a homewrecker or something, coming between you and Sunggyu,” Sungyeol muses with a wry twist to his lips. “Or maybe they’d think you broke up me and Myungsoo—“

“ _Why are you being such a dick_?” Woohyun’s voice has gone a little shrill, and the tone of it seems to surprise Sungyeol, but Woohyun doesn’t even notice his wide eyes because he’s too busy trying to keep himself from shaking. “How many times do I have to tell you that this isn’t _funny_? This isn’t a joke, Sungyeol, this is my life!”

Sungyeol blinks at him, then shakes his head, that seriousness back in his eyes. “Okay, you’re right. You’re right, I’m sorry. I was trying to…lighten the mood, and it backfired. I’m sorry. I know it’s serious.”

But the apology doesn’t help anything. “I can’t handle this right now,” Woohyun says, and he’s heading towards the door before he can even think about it, and he’s not doing such a good job of controlling his trembling anymore. He wants to go back to the dorm and climb into his bed and pull the covers over his head and, fuck, maybe cry for a while. Really, he wants to go _home_ , to his parents’ house that he hasn’t spent more than a night in since he became a trainee but that still is what he thinks of when he thinks of home. Maybe if he was there he could hold himself together, not feel like he’s coming apart. Maybe he’d be able to remember who he was before Lee Sungyeol. Maybe.

But he barely makes it two steps before Sungyeol’s pretty hands are around his bicep again and he’s being tugged backwards. “No—Woohyun, I’m sorry, I won’t joke anymore, I’m totally serious—“

“Don’t you see that that almost makes it _worse_?” Woohyun bites the words out, and when he glares at Sungyeol he sees understanding surfacing in his eyes.

“I—“ Sungyeol stops, shakes his head. “Look. Just stay for a little bit, okay? I promise I won’t make any more attempts at humor. I just think we need to talk about this.”

“ _You_ want to talk about something serious?” It’s not that he doesn’t think Sungyeol can be serious—he knows he can. But Sungyeol isn’t the kind to talk about his feelings or his struggles or anything like that. It isn’t his way. The fact that he actually wants to this time makes Woohyun hesitate.

“I do,” Sungyeol affirms. He shoves Woohyun a little, though Woohyun barely moves because it’s not like Sungyeol can put much force behind it. “I _could_ say that you owe me after making me freak the shit out this afternoon. Notice I’m not saying that.”

Sungyeol is such a jackass sometimes. Woohyun sighs. “I don’t like this, Sungyeol. I don’t like your idea.”

That’s apparently the only in Sungyeol needs, because he starts dragging Woohyun—well, trying to drag him; Woohyun has to _let_ him drag because otherwise Sungyeol wouldn’t be able to move him two steps—towards the bed. “That’s because you’re hearing it all wrong. You think I’m just playing around, but I’m not.”

Woohyun feels so, so tired as he lets Sungyeol push him onto the bed. “You are, Sungyeol, there’s no way in hell you’d be saying any of this otherwise.”

“See, that’s where you’re wrong,” Sungyeol says, climbing onto the bed beside him, completely oblivious to the way his skirt is shifting around his thighs. “I know I’m impulsive and stuff, and I usually just go with my gut. And leader is always giving me lectures about thinking before I act so you all think I can’t make serious decisions, but I _can_. I just…don’t bother to do it most of the time. Stop rolling your eyes. Here’s the part you need to listen to: I wouldn’t say any of this if it were anyone but you.”

Woohyun stares at him. And then, after a moment: “What.”

Sungyeol actually has the nerve to look impatient. “I _mean_ , if any of the other guys—if any other guy in the _world_ , probably—confessed to me, I would not tell him ‘let’s give it a try.’ I’d be weirded out and try to forget it. Unless it was, like, Sunggyu or something and then I’d be terrified and want to lock myself away in a safe-house somewhere. I know most people think being gay is totally gross, but I just really don’t care what other people do unless it directly affects me, and even if it does—like, if Myungsoo were in love with me or something, I wouldn’t stop talking to him or anything. I’d just tell him to forget about it and try to forget about it myself and keep things the way they were before. But it’s different because it’s you.”

Woohyun isn’t sure what these words—really ridiculous ones, honestly—are making him feel, but he knows that something is twisting inside him. “Sungyeol—“

“I’m _saying_ that I want to try this with you. Not with a guy—with you. If there’s any guy I could actually want to be with, it’s you.”

Well, that’s—that’s just— “How can you just say this stuff to me? Aren’t you embarrassed or self-conscious or something?” Woohyun demands, trying to cover up how raw he’s feeling right now, hoping Sungyeol won’t notice the color of his cheeks. “You aren’t even blushing!”

Sungyeol laughs. “After all that stuff you just said to me? There’s nothing I could say to you that would make me blush.”

No, it’s Woohyun who’s flushing and looking away, and Sungyeol laughs one more time and then he’s grabbing Woohyun’s face in his hands and kissing him again.

This kiss is less sweet than the one before, more sure, but it tears Woohyun apart inside just like the other one did. It’s sharper, so much more immediate now that Woohyun knows Sungyeol isn’t doing this just to punish him, and so Woohyun lets himself kiss Sungyeol back, lets himself do what he’s been wanting to do for months. 

And Sungyeol’s mouth is everything Woohyun had fantasized it would be. His lips are perfect and the texture of his tongue does things to Woohyun that hadn’t even known were possible and he _tastes_ like Sungyeol, like only Sungyeol could possibly taste. And Woohyun knows through his haze of confusion and _want_ that this is exactly the same as it would be if Sungyeol were in his own body: this kiss is him and Sungyeol and it doesn’t matter about gender because it’s them and because Sungyeol tastes like Sungyeol no matter what and he’s everything Woohyun ever wanted.

Sungyeol’s eyes have gone dark, pupils blown out, when the kiss finally ends, his voice breathy. “See, I like that,” he says, and Woohyun thinks hearing that is almost better than the kiss itself. But then of course Sungyeol has to ruin it. “Maybe it’s just because I’m so sexually deprived that I make monks look debauched. But I like it.”

Woohyun flinches. “God, you’re such an ass—“

“I really don’t think it’s the sexual frustration thing,” Sungyeol interrupts. “I think I really just like it.”

And then Sungyeol is kissing him again, and there’s nothing Woohyun can do except kiss back because this is _Sungyeol_. Woohyun isn’t letting himself think about anything that might happen in the future—not even in the next few _minutes_ —because he’s so conflicted, so tossed around by emotions and possibilities and confusion. Instead, he just sinks into the now, submerging himself in it, into Sungyeol’s mouth against his and the taste of Sungyeol that he never thought he’d know. He wants to wrap his arms around Sungyeol, pull him against him, but he holds himself back, concentrating everything on the kiss instead. 

When the kiss is over, Sungyeol still holds his face so close to Woohyun’s, noses almost touching, and Woohyun can feel his breath and _fuck_. “Yeah,” Sungyeol says as though something’s been confirmed for him. “I like it. A lot. So let’s try this. You and me.”

Fucking _hell_ , Woohyun wants to say yes. But wouldn’t it hurt so much more if he and Sungyeol have their little fling and Sungyeol decides he doesn’t like guys and then Woohyun loses him? Woohyun can’t imagine anything in the whole world hurting more than that.

But he can’t phrase it like that. “You realize this means giving up all the girls in the world, for me. Why the fuck would you want to do that?” The words don’t come out as lightly as he’d hoped.

“What girls?” Sungyeol says, looking around the room as though there might be humans of the female persuasion lurking in the corners. “Do you see any girls in my bed? Do you see any girls in our _dorm_? Do you see any girls who we’ve actually had conversations with in the past few years beyond ‘thank you for coming’ and ‘of course I’ll sign your album’ who aren’t also idols and guarded like they’re virgin priestesses or some shit like that? There aren’t exactly women coming out of my ears, Woohyun, nobody but me’s touched my junk in—“

“You’ve made your point,” Woohyun interrupts—why does Sungyeol keep jerking him around like this? When is Woohyun ever going to be able to find something solid to stand on? Maybe never when he’s talking to Sungyeol; the landscape keeps shifting, the ground changing right under his feet. “And like I said earlier, it sounds like you’re settling.”

Sungyeol slams his hand down on the bed. “Why do you keep taking it that way? Did you miss the point where I said you’re the only one I’d want to try this with? Sure, if we could date, I probably wouldn’t ever consider this, but it’s not because I’m settling, it’s because I wouldn’t _have_ to consider this.”

God, Sungyeol is the most infuriating person on the planet. Why the fuck is Woohyun in love with him again? “How the fuck else am I supposed to take it? There’s no other way to take it!” he argues, not even caring that his volume has risen.

“Yes, there is!” Sungyeol shouts back. “If I’m with you, I’m with _you_. If you decide to try this with me, even if CEO-nim lost his mind and decided to let us date and then some really hot girl wanted to go out with me, I’d say no, because I’d be with _you_. That’s not settling, Woohyun. That’s choosing you and figuring out if it works, just like you do with any other relationship. That’s how every relationship starts out, isn’t it? You’re getting to know each other and figuring out if you can work together. And you don’t know—you can never know, you just have to go for it and see how it turns out, so how is this any different? You just have to try it, or not. But it’s not settling! It’s choosing! There’s a difference! And what I’m saying is I’ll choose you!”

Woohyun’s mouth is a little dry, and his jaw is tense where he’s set it. He will never be able to comprehend the things Lee Sungyeol does to his head. He almost—he almost has a point there. He almost….

There’s something slowly cracking open in his chest, something he’s never quite let himself acknowledge, something tentative but alive chipping its way out of a shell Woohyun had thought was solid rock but that turns out to be so, so fragile. _Don’t do this to me, Sungyeol. Don’t offer me everything I want if it isn’t for good. I know you’d think it’s melodramatic, but I’d die if you take it back._

Sungyeol is staring at him with so much intensity Woohyun wants to run away or cry or _something_ because it’s just too _much_ , this is _Sungyeol_ and—

This time when Sungyeol kisses him, he pushes him back against the bed so that Woohyun’s sprawled on his back and Sungyeol is draped halfway over him. The heat of him, even though they’re not touching all that much, is so much more than Woohyun had dreamed. He’s softer, too, against Woohyun’s chest, but that’s because of the body he’s in and Woohyun likes it just as much as he’s always liked it when Sungyeol leans his bony self against him when he’s laughing or when they’re throwing hearts for the fans. Woohyun just likes Sungyeol against him, as close as he’s willing to be. 

There’s no tentativeness in Sungyeol’s kisses, not anymore. There wasn’t much to begin with, but he was more careful before—now he kisses like he knows exactly what he wants, like he’s trying to convince Woohyun of something—convince _Woohyun_ , not himself, and the thing being born in Woohyun’s chest shatters a bit more of its shell.

“You could…make me fall in love with you,” Sungyeol says, a little breathless as they pull back. Woohyun stares because _fuck_ , he’s so beautiful and what is he saying? Does he really mean that? Or is he just making fun of him? “Think of all the fans you’ve won over through sheer force of will. Though I don’t think your greasiness will work on me.”

Even though he’s a bit hazy-minded from the kissing, Woohyun manages to roll his eyes and is about to say something snarky in response to Sungyeol’s smirky look, but Sungyeol kisses him again, hard, cutting him off. It doesn’t last long, though, because Sungyeol pulls back again.

“You’re good at making people like you,” Sungyeol says, and his lips are swollen. “Most of us didn’t like you at first. I know I didn’t, and everyone knows Sunggyu couldn’t stand anything about you. Myungsoo and Sungjong thought you were cold and scary and Hoya just tried to ignore you, remember? I think Dongwoo was the only one who liked you, but he likes everyone.”

Fuck, just when Woohyun was starting to think this conversation had stopped being painful. “Sungyeol—“

Sungyeol carries on as though Woohyun didn’t try to interrupt him at all. “But now we all like you,” he says, and some of the pain eases. “All six of us are close to you, and you can’t say that about any of the other guys except Dongwoo. We all like you and we trust you and we think you’re awesome. You won us all over. All you had to do was actually show us who you are.” _Fuck, Sungyeol_. How can Sungyeol _do_ these things to him? How can he say things like that so casually, things that make Woohyun feel so much more than he knows how to deal with? How Sungyeol throw words that _big_ around like they’re nothing at all?

“Ow!” Woohyun yelps, then scowls, because Sungyeol is grinning down at him like he didn’t just flick him on the forehead.

“So just turn off the grease and the trying-too-hard and be you,” Sungyeol instructs. “How much you want to bet you end up winning me over?”

“Shouldn’t I be the one trying to convince you that I can make you—“ He can’t say the words, _fall in love with me_ , can’t put voice to them because if he tried they would come out desperate and needy and a plea instead of just words. 

Sungyeol shrugs. “You weren’t really trying, so I stepped in. Teamwork, and all that. I always thought you’d be really good at sales, but maybe I was wrong. Good thing I’m here to sell you for you.”

Woohyun can’t think of a single thing to say to that, but it doesn’t matter anyway, because Sungyeol dives for his mouth again. And Woohyun has to admit it to himself—Sungyeol doesn’t kiss like he’s experimenting, like he’s just trying to figure out if he could like kissing a guy. He kisses like he’s already decided that he _does_ , and the thought is enough to make Woohyun’s brain dribble out of his ears.

“So,” Sungyeol says when the kiss is over, face so close to Woohyun’s again. His eyes are almost black and his lips are swollen and Woohyun loves him _so fucking much_. “Are we going to try this?”

Maybe he shouldn’t do this. Maybe it’ll turn out terrible. Maybe Sungyeol will breaks his heart and it’ll leave Infinite strained and tense, affect their music and their dancing and their rapport, all the reasons the fans love them. Woohyun doesn’t risk Infinite, not ever; he always makes the right choices when it comes to Infinite, that’s why Sunggyu trusts him, that’s why the other guys respect him. Woohyun can be silly and cheesy, can be too sensitive and even immature at times, can try too hard so that he almost kills himself with the effort, but Woohyun is all of the best things about himself when it comes to Infinite. And Woohyun is clear-headed enough when it comes to his feelings for Sungyeol to know that though Sungyeol might be sincere about this, he doesn’t feel what Woohyun feels and so they won’t have those feelings to fall back on if things take a turn. There’s no guarantee with this, none whatsoever, and maybe Sungyeol is right that there never is when it comes to relationships—when it comes to anything—but that doesn’t mean that this isn’t even less certain than most relationships.

Maybe Woohyun should say no. Maybe he should give Sungyeol one last kiss (because he wouldn’t be able to resist at least that) and walk out of this room and try to put all of the things that have happened today behind him. Maybe that’s the only wise thing to do, the only thing anyone with any common sense would advise.

But it’s Sungyeol. And he’s asking.

It’s not like Woohyun ever stood a chance.

“Yeah. Yeah, let’s try,” he breathes, and Sungyeol smiles, gummy and beautiful.

And that’s the moment when Woohyun’s phone rings. 

They stare at each other blankly for a moment as though they’ve forgotten what a phone even is, and then Woohyun is fumbling in his pocket to find it.

“Are you really going to answer that?” Sungyeol asks, sounding impatient.

“It’s probably Gyu—if I don’t answer, he’ll come steaming over here himself, you know he will.”

Sungyeol pouts— _pouts_ , what the fuck does he think he’s doing? fuck, look at his _lips_ —but rolls his eyes in acknowledgment. Woohyun finally wrangles his phone out of his pocket (his pants are a little tight at the moment, okay?) and has just accepted the call when Sungyeol swipes it out of his hand.

“Ya! Lee Sungyeol!”

“Hello, hyung!” Sungyeol chirps into the phone, and Woohyun gapes at him. Sungyeol just smiles back cheekily, reclining on his arm—the elbow of which just happens to be resting in the middle of Woohyun’s chest—like Woohyun is there just to support him.

Sunggyu’s voice is small and tinny but Woohyun can hear it anyway. “Where the hell is Woohyun? Did you kill him? Is that why you have his phone?”

“I was just showing him what it’s like when someone steals your phone without permission, hyung,” Sungyeol answers, looking ridiculously pleased with himself. Woohyun rolls his eyes and jerks on Sungyeol’s ponytail, ignoring the boniness of Sungyeol’s elbow in the middle of his chest.

“Stop that,” Sungyeol hisses, slapping his hand away. But Woohyun keeps tugging, to the point where eventually Sungyeol ignores him.

“Well, if you’re done ripping him a new one, can you send him home? We have schedules in the morning.”

Woohyun is still yanking on Sungyeol’s ponytail, but every time he does it, Sungyeol pokes him with one of his long fingers. “Hmm….” Sungyeol says, poking Woohyun’s bicep. “No, I don’t think I can.”

“What?” Woohyun says, hand freeze mid-pull.

“What?” Sunggyu says, sounding blank even through the phone.

“No, see, Woohyun is going to be staying here tonight, but don’t worry, I’ll make sure he’s at schedules on time in the morning. And don’t bother calling back, I’m turning off both of our phones. Goodnight, hyung!” The words come out all in a bright rush and then Sungyeol is ending the call without an answer and actually turning off the phone and tossing it over his shoulder. 

It takes Woohyun a moment to recover from his shock, and then he pushes Sungyeol off of him and himself upright till his back is against the headboard because he can’t handle this lying down. “Sungyeol, you _can’t_ , we can’t ever be out of touch, what the—“

“Oh, whatever,” Sungyeol says airily, reaching for his own phone from the bedside stand and thumbing it off, too. “The hyungs all know where we are. If there’s some sort of emergency, they’ll contact the hotel.”

And that reminds him…. “I can’t stay here, Sungyeol, what the fuck are you thinking?” _Lee Sungyeol, what are you **thinking**?_

“Of course you can,” Sungyeol answers. “We’d be idiots if we didn’t take an opportunity like this. When are we ever going to get a room to ourselves again?”

Woohyun flushes scarlet. “Sungyeol, we can’t—“

But he doesn’t finish because Sungyeol is swinging a leg over him and then dropping down, _straddling_ him, and then he leans close, hair brushing against Woohyun’s bare arm, and he drags his lips across Woohyun’s neck up to his ear, agonizing but so, so good. Woohyun shudders, eyes falling closed, and Sungyeol’s voice is as hot as his breath against Woohyun’s skin as he rasps a whisper. “Don't you want to find out if you can turn me on?”

And then Woohyun can’t keep his hands to himself anymore. His arms go around Sungyeol, pulling him close to him, one of his hands slipping up under the back of Sungyeol’s shirt to splay against the impossibly soft skin of his back, the other unable to resist sliding down to get a good grip on his thigh, one of those beautiful, tempting legs that have been torturing Woohyun all day—and a lot longer than that. Sungyeol has thrown his arms around Woohyun’s shoulders and is kissing him deep and hard, mouth insistent to the point almost of pain. This isn’t just kissing anymore, this is full-on making out, Sungyeol’s warm, slight body pressed tight against his, those fucking incredible legs squeezing around Woohyun’s hips, his mouth trying to coax the soul right out of his body…Woohyun is so easily overcome.

Except he can’t be. Not when this is so important. 

It takes him some time to convince his body that his mind is right, but finally Woohyun takes Sungyeol by the hips and puts him a little bit away from him. Sungyeol’s still straddling him, but his lips are thankfully not distracting Woohyun at the moment. Well, they are, but not by touching his. “This is a really bad idea, Sungyeol.”

Sungyeol’s hair is falling out of his ponytail and his lips are so red and his eyes so dark and he looks messy and fucking amazing. “Oh, so you’re going to give me the ‘we’re moving too fast’ speech now?”

Well, they _are_ , but that’s not what Woohyun is concerned about at the moment. “I mean while you’re—while you’re in this body,” he says, hands tightening on Sungyeol’s hips.

Sungyeol gives him a look like that’s the stupidest thing he’s ever heard. “I’m me, aren’t I?”

“You are, but—“

“That’s what this whole day has been about confirming, right?”

“Yeah, but—”

“And you like me just as much like this, right?”

Why doesn’t he get it? “That’s the _point_ , Sungyeol, I don’t want you to think that this is about you being a girl—“

“I think we’ve pretty well covered that territory,” Sungyeol says impatiently, but when Woohyun doesn’t show any signs of relenting he throws his hands in the air. “Fine. Let’s try it like this. If you were the one who got to choose which body I have for the rest of my life, which one would you choose?”

Woohyun doesn’t even have to think about it. “Your real one. Of course.” _Because that’s what you want._

“Right, and I believe you. So. There’s nothing to worry about.” His voice drops in volume and pitch, and he leans closer again, and Woohyun feels like his eyes might cross and he’ll never be able to see straight again. “Besides, it would be a total waste not to try this body out while I have it, don’t you think?”

Those fucking amazing lips are just about to brush against Woohyun’s when Sungyeol jerks back, his eyes wide as though a thought has just shoved its way into his brain. “Unless—wait, you like guys, you like me as a guy and now I’m a girl and can you—I mean—“

Woohyun thinks about bucking up underneath him and letting Sungyeol feel just how much this body can do for him, thinks about how amazing his orgasm was after jerking himself off in the shower when he saw Sungyeol naked in this body. But instead he just says, “I like girls, too. And even if I didn’t…it’s _you_.” 

Sungyeol holds his gaze for a moment, eyes so very intense, and then he’s kissing Woohyun like he’ll die if he stops, and everything is Sungyeol’s taste and Sungyeol’s skin and Sungyeol’s warmth and Sungyeol’s smell and every possible objection, every shred of common sense, every niggling doubt about whether this is a good idea, is lost in a rush of _Sungyeol Sungyeol Sungyeol Sungyeol Sungyeol_.

Woohyun never stood a chance.


	6. Chapter 6

Sungyeol isn’t a sappy person. He used to be, crying too often over stupid things—he remembers weeping at weddings of people he’s never even met, being a mess when Jiae left even if he hadn’t been close to her, locking himself in the bathroom to sob during trainee days. But somewhere along the line—whether it was because of the lack of callbacks stacking up or the pressures of being an idol or just maturing the way anyone does as they get older—he’s grown past that, put it behind him, and he doesn’t cry much anymore. He accepts greasiness for the fans, throws hearts with Woohyun now, even says some ridiculous things sometimes. But that’s for the fans, a way of showing his appreciation, and it’s different than how he interacts with people who actually know him. He doesn’t say sincere things about his feelings very often, and he’s mostly unimpressed when the other guys start talking about how much they mean to each other. If they really do mean that much, it isn’t really necessary to talk about it, now is it? He rolls his eyes at sentimental things.

But, fuck, even Sungyeol can’t resist hearing those words from Woohyun: _And even if I didn’t…it’s **you**._ Of course he can’t: no one could, or at least that’s what he tells himself: anyone would like to hear something like that.

_I told you you could make me fall in love with you, Nam Woohyun. Keep this up and it won’t be a problem at all._

It’s weird, thinking that. Weird to realize that it’s Woohyun he’s kissing so furiously, Woohyun who’s his friend and a _guy_ , Woohyun who he once thought was a buzzkill and a tightass. Woohyun who he schemes with and laughs with and, sometimes, talks about how hard idol life is with. Woohyun who he’d never once considered in this way, but who he’s now kissing like they’ve been kissing all their lives.

Woohyun’s lips against his are hungry and yearning, Woohyun’s hands on his skin are warm and callused. Woohyun’s body against his is firm and strong, Woohyun’s scent in his lungs is familiar and comforting. This should feel strange or scary or something, but it doesn’t. It doesn’t at all.

He’s always felt more comfortable touching Woohyun than any of the other guys. Sungyeol isn’t a touchy person, and he never has been, and he’s never really understood why Myungsoo and Dongwoo need to be hanging over someone all the time. The way Myungsoo gets, it’s too much, too intense, like he wants to be a _part_ of the person he’s latched onto (like he wants to be a part of Sungyeol), and that’s just more than Sungyeol can handle. He tolerates it, because he knows that Myungsoo needs it and Myungsoo is his best friend, but it’s never something he feels all that comfortable reciprocating. Dongwoo is less intense, but he’s so handsy, and if he were anyone else but Dongwoo Sungyeol wouldn’t put up with it at all. It’s okay because it’s Dongwoo, sweet Dongwoo who none of them can deny anything, but the cuddling isn’t something Sungyeol would ever seek out on his own. He and Sungjong aren’t uncomfortable touching each other, but they only do it on rare occasions because it isn’t in their nature to do more. And Sunggyu and Hoya he barely touches at all.

But Woohyun—Woohyun he’s always felt comfortable with sharing casual touches with: Woohyun’s arm around his shoulder, Woohyun’s hands on his waist, their fingers playing with each other as they talk about other things. He just laughs too when Woohyun leans against him collapsing with mirth, and he doesn’t mind when he feels Woohyun’s hand at the small of his back. He’s never really spent much time considering why that is, why it’s different with Woohyun, because it’s never mattered before. But now that he’s thinking about it, he thinks he can see why. It’s not overwhelming the way it is Myungsoo, and it doesn’t feel like he’s being touched the way anyone would be the way it is with Dongwoo. With Woohyun, it feels like Woohyun just wants to touch _him_ , wants to be sure of him beside him, wants to let Sungyeol know that he’s there and he likes him. It’s never too much and if Sungyeol pulls away Woohyun lets him and that makes a difference. Sungyeol doesn’t have to analyze it, never feels the pressure to give anything back he doesn’t want to give. Woohyun just reaches for him, and when he does, it’s comfortable and familiar and right.

Maybe that’s why Sungyeol can do this now, can press his body against Woohyun’s and let Woohyun’s hand flatten against his back. Maybe that’s why he isn’t totally freaked out at the idea of Woohyun wanting him, at the idea of figuring out if he could ever want Woohyun (he’s beginning to suspect he could). Maybe that’s the only reason why this is happening now. 

Sungyeol grips Woohyun’s shoulders and thinks about how different his body is than a girl’s. Sungyeol likes the curves of girls’ bodies, the softness of them or the tightness of their skin. He likes their hair and the way they smell, the sound of their voices, the prettiness of their faces. He reacts to them viscerally, doesn’t contemplate what it means, because he knows the way he’s drawn to them is natural and expected. When he looks at guys’ bodies, it’s usually to compare them to his own and when there’s appreciation, it’s only in the aesthetic admiration sort of way. He’s never really _noticed_ a guy’s body, not like he’s noticing Woohyun’s now.

The bone and muscle of his shoulders, even through the cotton of his t-shirt, are surprisingly appealing. Sungyeol squeezes those shoulders tighter as Woohyun detaches his mouth from Sungyeol’s and his lips suddenly appear against Sungyeol’s collarbones. Sungyeol lets out a little yelp at the feel of Woohyun’s tongue on his skin, and for a half-second he’s confused by the shrillness of the sound before he remembers that, oh, yeah, he’s a girl. But that just seems completely irrelevant when Woohyun’s hot breath is fanning against the damp skin of his collarbones. Sungyeol’s hands slide down Woohyun’s arms till they’re gripping the bare skin of his biceps, and _fuck_ , Woohyun really has nice arms. Sungyeol can feel the muscles shift under the skin as Woohyun’s hand skims higher up Sungyeol’s back, and Sungyeol isn’t sure which sensation is making him shiver. Or maybe it’s Woohyun’s mouth, still exploring his clavicle. Or maybe it’s everything, all together.

Woohyun raises his head suddenly, leaving Sungyeol feeling dizzy.

“You really like this?” Woohyun asks, and Sungyeol can’t decide whether the look in his eyes and the tone of his voice is awed or skeptical. Probably both.

Sungyeol squeezes his knees tighter against Woohyun’s hips. “You really think I’d be doing this if I didn’t?”

Woohyun’s mouth tightens. “Sungyeol—“

“Do _you_ really like this?” Sungyeol shoots back, and he unconsciously digs his fingernails into Woohyun’s arms at the way Woohyun’s eyes darken.

“So much I can barely believe it’s real.”

There he goes again, with the comments Sungyeol should find greasy but somehow just make him squirm with excitement. He pushes Woohyun back against the headboard and attacks his lips again, and Woohyun’s hand squeezes hard on his thigh and it feels really fucking good, that hand. 

Maybe it’s his ego that likes this, that likes the things that Woohyun says to him and the helplessness in his eyes. Anyone would like someone being this infatuated with him, right? But it isn’t just someone, it’s Woohyun, and for all he’s so over the top with the fans, Woohyun doesn’t say things to his friends that he doesn’t mean. Woohyun can be mischievous, can be careless with people’s feelings when he’s too worked up, but he’s a really, really good friend, and he would never play with Sungyeol like this. He wouldn’t.

And Sungyeol isn’t playing with him, either. Though there almost is a sense of play about this, a newness to the exploration that feels a little playful. On impulse, Sungyeol grabs hold of the hem of Woohyun’s shirt and starts tugging it upwards.

“Sungyeol—what’re you—what—“

“I’m taking your shirt off, dumbass,” Sungyeol says, squeezing his legs around Woohyun’s hips to get him to raise his hands. Woohyun does, looking uncertain. “What does it look like I’m doing?”

“Yeol—“

Sungyeol drags the shirt off, and he’s too busy looking at Woohyun’s chest to notice the tentativeness in Woohyun’s eyes.

He’s seen Woohyun shirtless a million times, so often that he barely even registers if it’s clothed or not anymore. But he’s never really taken the time to notice that Woohyun’s body is different than his own—even his own real one—except to note how much more muscle Woohyun has. But there are differences, too, that have nothing to do with how Woohyun nearly kills himself working out, that are there simply because they’re different people, and this is the first time Sungyeol has taken the time to notice them. Where Sungyeol is broader in the shoulders and so narrow in the hips, the triangle of Woohyun’s torso isn’t nearly so extreme. His skin is several shades darker than Sungyeol’s, and instead of being soft like Sungyeol’s, it’s smooth, so smooth that Sungyeol can’t resist touching it, noting the difference in texture from that of his own body as Woohyun sucks in his breath. And then, of course, there’s the musculature, his pecs and the hollow between them, the grooves and hills of his abs, and as Sungyeol’s fingers trace over them, they twitch and jump. Sungyeol is so fascinated—Woohyun’s midriff is so different than his own, which is (almost) flat but just a little soft—that he almost doesn’t even hear Woohyun gasp, though he feels Woohyun’s hands drop to his hips and hold on tight.

“No wonder the fangirls like it when you flash your abs,” Sungyeol notes absently. “They’re kind of amazing, aren’t they?” He thinks maybe he should be jealous, looking at this perfect definition, and often enough he is, wishing he could have a body like Woohyun’s or Hoya’s or Dongwoo’s. But right now he’s just interested in studying it. It doesn’t make him hot all over like seeing a girl in a bikini does, but he can appreciate it, likes the feel of it under his hands—really, really, _really_ likes the way Woohyun squirms with each touch. 

Without thinking about it, he leans down and attaches his lips to the one bit of softness he sees, right where Woohyun’s arm meets his body, near and a little above his armpit (but not so near that it’s gross), and he sucks. Woohyun lets out a moan, hands clamping down on Sungyeol’s waist almost to the point of pain, and when Sungyeol pulls back and looks at him, his eyes are screwed up tight.

Sungyeol breathes out a little laugh and leans in to kiss him, coaxing with his mouth till Woohyun’s eyes relax and his hands loosen on Sungyeol’s hips. When Sungyeol sits back, Woohyun’s fingers are playing with the hem of his shirt, but Woohyun doesn’t seem to notice what he’s doing, too busy staring at Sungyeol like he’s never seen him before (and Sungyeol would be lying if he said that the awe in Woohyun’s gaze doesn’t send excited sparks fizzing through his body).

“Are you going to take care of that?” Sungyeol asks after a moment, a bit impatient now.

Woohyun’s eyes are a still dazed, which makes Sungyeol feel strangely satisfied. “Take care of what?”

Sungyeol sighs. “Never mind, I’ll do it.” And then he brushes Woohyun’s hands away and pulls his own shirt off.

Woohyun’s eyes go really wide, and okay, now Sungyeol is starting to feel self-conscious. He hadn’t thought he’d feel that at all, not when Woohyun is so obviously smitten with him (and Sungyeol really, really likes that), but…this body. It isn’t _Sungyeol’s_ , and for the first time he thinks he understands why Woohyun had thought this wasn’t such a good idea. Woohyun is just staring at his torso, and, oh, yeah—Sungyeol had forgotten that he’d angrily taken the bra off almost as soon as he stepped into this room, hurling it into the corner and breathing a sigh of relief that he was free of it. So now he’s bare to Woohyun’s gaze, and…yeah.

“Sungyeol,” Woohyun breathes, but he doesn’t say anything else, doesn’t reach out to touch, just stares, and a thought, small and ugly and half-scared, burrows its way out of the darkness of Sungyeol’s subconscious: _what if he likes me better like this?_

It shouldn’t matter, because it’s not like he’s in love with Woohyun or anything, and Woohyun had _said_ —it shouldn’t matter. But it kind of does.

“Sungyeol,” Woohyun says again, voice so soft and somehow raw. “You’re so different now….” And then he reaches out, and Sungyeol almost winces, because he knows, he _knows_ what those hands are going for—

But then those strong, warm hands splay themselves over Sungyeol’s belly, covering it almost completely, and making Sungyeol gasp at the feel of them on his skin, and then Woohyun says, “But this is still you, here.”

Sungyeol is suspended for a moment in the feel of Woohyun touching him, and then he gets tangled in what Woohyun is saying— _even now, he still sees **me**_ —but then something that’s kind of giddy and ridiculous and maybe even relieved slams into him and he starts laughing. Woohyun looks up sharply, blinking, and Sungyeol can’t stop laughing.

“Did you seriously just bypass my tits and go for my stomach?” he manages between giggles. “What kind of perv _are_ you?”

Woohyun flushes, trying to look like he’s not embarrassed, but Sungyeol can see right through him. “I was just _comparing_ , okay?”

“I don’t believe you actually like girls anymore—you’re totally gay!”

Sungyeol smacks him on the shoulder, laughing like he isn’t straddling Nam Woohyun while both of them are topless—while he has _tits_ —and Woohyun is totally glaring at him now, but the doesn’t care. “God, you really don’t care about which body I’m in, do you?” This is fucking _hilarious_ , but maybe only so very much so because there’s something huge and scary lurking underneath it. _He just wants **me**._

Woohyun rolls his eyes, cheeks still pink, acting like he’s going to move Sungyeol off of him and get up, but Sungyeol’s not going to let that happen. Not allowing himself to think about it (because he may have told Woohyun that he’ll never have to feel self-conscious in front of Woohyun again, but he’s finding that isn’t true), he reaches out and grabs Woohyun’s hands and brings them to his chest. And abruptly stops laughing when they automatically cup his breasts, and if Sungyeol had thought those hands felt good on his back, his stomach, they’re nothing compared to how they feel here. 

It’s like the roughness of Woohyun’s hands is heightened by the softness of Sungyeol’s skin, the contrast somehow so _much_ , and Woohyun’s hands are big enough and Sungyeol’s breasts are small enough that it somehow feels like Woohyun is holding all of him. Sungyeol breathes hard, arching his back unconsciously, and he notices distantly that Woohyun’s ears and neck are a bit red as he gently squeezes. And that’s—okay, yeah.

“What’re they like?” Woohyun asks, voice barely audible, and as he does, one of his thumbs skids over a nipple and Sungyeol jolts in his lap and gasps sharply.

“I don’t know,” Sungyeol breathes, and his head is buzzing and this is weird and new, and he’s staring down at how he’s now puckered from Woohyun’s touch—just that little touch, barely anything at all. “But that feels really good and— _holy shit, Woohyun_!”

Sungyeol’s hands clamp around Woohyun’s biceps, his knees around Woohyun’s waist, and he would swear he can see sparks exploding like fireworks in front of his eyes. Woohyun’s tongue against his areola is just the slightest bit rough in this way that manages to be completely fucking amazing because it’s also damp and warm and…wow. 

Woohyun, though, jerks back at Sungyeol’s reaction, head raising and worried eyes flying up to his. 

“Was that—I’m sorry—are you—?” He looks torn, like he can’t decide if he did something wrong when he just ducked his head and gave Sungyeol a lick without warning. 

Sungyeol, though, is too shaken to reassure him. “Holy fuck, Woohyun, I didn’t _know_ —“ He can’t figure out what he wants to say, but it must show on his face or something, because Woohyun relaxes a bit, worry easing from his eyes and leaving only tentativeness—and behind that, rising excitement—behind.

“Can I…?” Woohyun asks, voice cracking a bit, and the hand that’s still cupping Sungyeol’s breast tightens just a bit in a really good way.

“Yeah. Fuck. Yeah.”

Woohyun lowers his head slowly this time, and for a moment Sungyeol can just feel the heat of his breath on his skin and that’s almost too good, especially when he can smell the scent of Woohyun’s shampoo and underneath that the smell of someone’s head (it’s always been one of Sungyeol’s favorite smells) and there’s the brush of Woohyun’s silky hair against his breastbone and then—

Sungyeol has no idea what the sound that wrestles its way out of his throat is, but he really doesn’t care. Doesn’t care, either, that he’s somehow thrown his head back and is digging his nails into Woohyun’s arms. Because that’s Woohyun’s _mouth_ , and it’s wet and hot and his _tongue_ and Sungyeol is tingling down in the parts of him he hasn’t allowed himself to explore and there’s a dampness rising there, too, and Sungyeol starts squirming in Woohyun’s lap as Woohyun sucks and Woohyun’s hands on his hips are holding on so tight it’s almost painful but Sungyeol can’t pay the slightest bit of attention to them. 

The air on damp skin seems too cold to be comfortable when Woohyun removes his mouth and Sungyeol makes a noise of protest, but then Woohyun moves to the other side and there’s his tongue tracing the areola and playing with the bud of his nipple and then there’s his mouth again and Sungyeol can’t help but grind against the ridge of the zipper of Woohyun’s jeans and _that_ feels really good especially when he shifts just a little and the friction is against just the right place as he grinds again and again and—

“Okay, that’s not going to work.” Woohyun’s voice is choked when he raises his head again, leaving Sungyeol whining again, trying to keep moving despite how Woohyun’s hands on his hips are trying to hold him still. 

“Uh, it works really, _really_ well, Woohyun, what’re you—“

Woohyun shifts his hips, bucking up just a bit, and _oh_ , that wasn’t just Woohyun’s zipper Sungyeol had been grinding against, that was—oh. Okay. Well.

Sungyeol doesn’t even have time to flush (at the idea of Woohyun beginning to get hard from playing with Sungyeol’s tits or from Sungyeol humping him or—fuck, this is the most surreal experience of Sungyeol’s life, and that definitely counts the morning he woke up as a girl) because Woohyun’s arms are behind his back and then Woohyun is flipping them so that Sungyeol’s on his back, lying him down gently on the bed and moving over him.

Woohyun’s face is just a few inches from Sungyeol’s now, and Sungyeol knows this should be freaking him out, him lying on this bed in a hotel room, topless and with tits, Woohyun’s flushed face with his eyes so dark just above his, but it isn’t, somehow. It’s weird—really, really weird—but in a good way, and even the intensity of Woohyun’s eyes so close to his doesn’t make him feel like he should run away.

“You like it—it’s good?” Woohyun asks the question like it’s the most important question that’s ever been asked and something seizes up in Sungyeol’s chest. _Fuck, he cares so **much**._ It’s more than a bit overwhelming, knowing that Woohyun feels that much for him, and Sungyeol has absolutely no idea what he did to deserve it. He’s never tried to win Woohyun over—Sungyeol’s never tried to win anyone over before (okay, except for a few pretty girls), secure in his belief that if someone doesn’t like him, they’re the one that’s missing out. And if things had been weird between him and Woohyun when they first met, well, Sungyeol was sure it was Woohyun’s fault. Their friendship had snuck up on him, and Sungyeol had never put much effort into it, though now he’s beginning to suspect that Woohyun did. Sungyeol had been glad enough to be friends once Woohyun started showing his real self, so much more likable than the guy he’d tried to be at first. But maybe most of the gestures, the moments of offering of friendship, had been from Woohyun to him. Which makes this whole thing even more head-swimmingly crazy because Sungyeol hadn’t even ever _tried_ , and Woohyun looks at him like this. What the fuck is his life?

Woohyun is just looking at him, waiting for his answer, and he’s toying with a strand of Sungyeol’s hair that’s pulled loose from his ponytail, though Sungyeol doesn’t think he realizes he’s doing it. Sungyeol can feel the warmth of Woohyun’s bare stomach and chest pressed against his, and the feel of skin on skin is one of the best feelings in the world. 

“Yeah. It’s good,” he says, and then even before Woohyun’s eyes can light up, he grabs Woohyun’s head and pulls him down for a kiss.

It may be Sungyeol’s imagination—it probably is—but he could swear Woohyun tastes different now, that somehow now that Woohyun’s mouth has explored Sungyeol’s skin, something about Woohyun’s flavor has changed. That should be gross, maybe, but it really isn’t, and Sungyeol kisses him as deep as he can, somehow feeling that he needs to discover every corner of Woohyun’s mouth. Maybe because he’s beginning to suspect that it’s the greatest mouth in the world.

“Sungyeol.” Woohyun’s voice is so raspy when he pulls back, and Sungyeol likes the sound of it, shivering a bit as he slides his fingers into the belt loops of Woohyun’s jeans. Woohyun bumps his nose against Sungyeol’s cheek, his ear, moving to tongue around the studs in Sungyeol’s ear, tugging on them softly until the slightest prick of pain rises—but it’s good, Sungyeol likes it, fingers tightening around the belt loops till they bite into his fingers as he feels Woohyun’s breath against the skin behind his ear, as he feels the weight of Woohyun’s chest pressing into him, flattening Sungyeol’s breasts and making his toes flex a little.

But then Sungyeol has to release his hold on Woohyun’s jeans because Woohyun is sliding down, nuzzling Sungyeol’s neck and collarbones, down further, mouthing and licking and making Sungyeol squirm again. Woohyun lavishes his breasts with attention for a few minutes, drawing little moans out of Sungyeol and making Sungyeol slide his feet against Woohyun’s legs, the worn fabric of the jeans somehow grounding in the reality of this moment. There’s a throbbing between his legs, and yeah, he can definitely feel some slickness building up in his underwear, and he whines, lifting his hips a bit, because this position doesn’t let him grind against Woohyun at all, and he _needs_ something to grind against, especially if Woohyun is going to keep this up.

But he doesn’t. Leaving Sungyeol gasping, Woohyun wiggles down further, his chin bumping against the slight rise of Sungyeol’s ribs and then he presses a kiss to Sungyeol’s belly, against the softness near his navel. There’s some more nuzzling, and then Woohyun rests his warm cheek against Sungyeol’s stomach, hooking his fingers underneath the waistband of Sungyeol’s skirt but not moving it at all. Strange: it’s actually a kind of relief after how twitchy the attention to his breasts had made Sungyeol feel, and maybe he needed it, a moment to get control of himself again, so he lets Woohyun lay there, breath just a bit damp against Sungyeol’s skin, the weight of his head weirdly pleasant as it rests on Sungyeol’s belly.

Except that Woohyun just stays there. Sungyeol had thought Woohyun had known he’d needed a break, but he’s had it now, back in control of himself again, and yet Woohyun seems to be perfectly content just laying there and nuzzling Sungyeol’s stomach for no good reason. After a second, Sungyeol jabs his heel into Woohyun’s leg.

“What the fuck are you doing? Did you need a nap or something?” Sungyeol demands.

Woohyun’s fingers tighten on the waist of Sungyeol’s skirt, but he doesn’t raise his head. “No,” he mumbles. “I just—this right here—this is just like how you are in your real body. This hasn’t changed at all.”

The words make something flash through Sungyeol again, but it’s different this time, not sexual—or at least not fully—and he’s not sure he can deal with it. He smacks Woohyun on the head—not hard. Okay, not _that_ hard. Woohyun just expels a breath that makes the muscles of Sungyeol’s stomach jump.

Sungyeol clears his throat, trying to think of something to say that will stop this squirming feeling. “You know what else hasn’t changed?” 

“Mmm?” Woohyun’s reaction is so noncommittal Sungyeol isn’t sure if Woohyun is even listening to him at all.

“My ass.”

Woohyun’s head flies up, eyes wide, and the realization of what he just said shoots into Sungyeol so hard that he flushes hot all over. “I mean—that’s not what I meant—I wasn’t saying—! Stop _laughing_ , you dick!”

Woohyun buries his face in Sungyeol’s stomach, the puffs of air from his laughing and the brush of his eyelashes making Sungyeol’s muscles twitch all over the place. 

Sungyeol yanks on Woohyun’s hair—hard, because he deserves it, the asshole. “I was just saying that my ass is the same, you don’t have to go and— _stop laughing_ or I’ll kick _your_ ass!”

But Woohyun is still laughing, and then he presses his mouth to Sungyeol’s skin and blows a raspberry into it, making Sungyeol jump and slap his shoulder. “What the fuck—I’m not a _baby_ , oh my _God_ , Woohyun, what is your _problem_?”

Woohyun raises his head again, and he’s still laughing, his cheeks pink. “You should just be glad I don’t take that as an invitation, Lee Sungyeol.”

“You _would_ go there, you gaywad, I bet you have all sorts of plans for my ass!” Sungyeol is totally going to shove Woohyun off of him and onto the floor, the jerk.

“Not so much plans as fantasies,” Woohyun says, eyebrow rising and he’s still grinning, the asshole, “but I’m sure I can adapt them pretty quickly.”

“Like hell you will!” Sungyeol launches himself upright, grappling at Woohyun’s arms, and Woohyun won’t stop laughing, even as Sungyeol flails his fists at him, punching him completely painlessly. The two of them wrestling topless with the comforter of the bed bunching underneath them, with Sungyeol having even less upper body strength than usual and Woohyun just humoring him—it’s totally ridiculous and yet Sungyeol doesn’t hate this moment. He doesn’t hate it at all. “You’re not getting anywhere near my ass!”

By the time Woohyun grabs Sungyeol’s wrists and wrestles him down onto the bed (gently: Sungyeol could pull away at any time, and he’s never been so aware of Woohyun’s strength as he is at this moment, seeing him hold it in check so that Sungyeol won’t feel attacked), Sungyeol is maybe laughing a little, too. Or at lot. Whatever. It’s just from the weirdness of the situation; Nam Woohyun is _not funny_ , no matter what he thinks.

Woohyun’s eyes are sparkling as leans over Sungyeol and slides one of his hands up under the back of Sungyeol’s skirt, skimming up the back of his thigh—and making Sungyeol’s breathing speed up—and up until he’s cupping Sungyeol’s butt through his cotton underwear. “I’m not getting anywhere near this ass?” Woohyun says, and his voice is too teasing for Sungyeol’s liking. “This ass here that I’m touching?”

Sungyeol finds that he’s wrapped his legs around Woohyun’s waist without even thinking about it, and he thinks about removing them but it’s too late for that. Instead, he just glares at Woohyun. “Squeeze away, dick-face, because that’s all you’re ever going to be doing with it.”

Woohyun squeezes obediently, causing Sungyeol to start, and it makes no sense to Sungyeol that Woohyun looks so pleased with it because Sungyeol knows his ass is flat and bonier than any ass has a right to be. The other guys have asses the girls on the internet flail over, but his isn’t anything that exciting. Only Woohyun doesn’t seem to know that.

“You were right,” Woohyun says, teasing falling away to something like awe. “This hasn’t changed either.”

Well, that’s just—hey, wait a minute. “How the fuck would you know?” Sungyeol demands, using one of his heels to pound one of Woohyun’s butt cheeks in retaliation. “Have you been feeling me up in my sleep? You aren’t Dongwoo—you don’t go around grabbing people’s asses! How the fuck do you know what my ass feels like?”

Woohyun looks caught between indignation and embarrassment. “I don’t know what it feels like,” he snaps, “but I—“ And then he stops abruptly and his ears and neck are turning red again and Sungyeol throws his head back to laugh.

“Oh my God, you’ve totally been checking my ass out! You weren’t kidding about that fantasizing thing—you’ve been staring at my ass and I didn’t even know it, you giant perv!” He grabs a handful of Woohyun’s hair and gives it a good tug, still laughing.

“It’s not perverted!” Woohyun protests, looking flustered but trying to appear annoyed. “Like you don’t fantasize about hot girl’s asses when you see them!”

Sungyeol gives his hair another fond tug. “You like my ass so much you’ve memorized it so you can tell it hasn’t changed at all!” he crows. “And it’s not even a good one!”

“Yeah, well, it’s yours!” Woohyun retorts and _fuck, he really has to stop saying things like that_. What is his _problem_? Like every single thing about Sungyeol is perfect just because it’s his? Fuck.

He just doesn’t know how to react when Woohyun says things like that—it makes him feel…well, he doesn’t have a word for it, but like his skin is too small to hold him, like he needs to escape it. He’s got to change the dynamic fast; he doesn’t know how to deal with feeling this way.

So he flicks Woohyun’s forehead between the eyes.

“Ow!”

“What else have you been fantasizing about?”

“Excuse me?”

God, Woohyun is kind of adorable when he’s embarrassed and trying to cover it up. “You heard me. So you like my ass. And apparently my stomach more than any normal person should like a stomach. What other parts of me have you been fixating on?”

Woohyun snorts. “Oh, yeah, I’m really going to tell you that, Mr. Laughed-at-Me-Twice-Already.”

“Like you didn’t laugh at me! Come on! I want to know!” Sungyeol whines, hitching his legs up higher around Woohyun’s hips.

“No,” Woohyun says shortly. “There’s no way I’m telling you that.”

There’s no way, huh? Sungyeol reaches up and hooks his arms around Woohyun’s shoulders, pulling himself up a bit and Woohyun down till their lips are brushing. He drops his voice as much as he can without sounding like an idiot, and part of him feels self-conscious for doing this, but the other part of him is only aware of how dark Woohyun’s eyes are as they stare at him. “You really won’t tell me?” 

“No,” Woohyun repeats, but he sounds a whole lot less adamant than he did a minute ago. Inwardly, Sungyeol smiles.

He pulls himself up a bit more, brushing his lips teasingly across Woohyun’s cheekbones and up to his ear to whisper, breath and tone hot against his earlobe. “Tell me.”

Woohyun swallows—hard—before he answers this time, “No.” It’s all Sungyeol can do to keep the grin off his face, but he hasn’t wanted to be an actor since he was a little kid for nothing. He manages.

This time he seeks out Woohyun’s lips, and though Woohyun tries to keep his still and impenetrable, Sungyeol isn’t deterred, kissing them and running his tongue along them until they finally part. Woohyun’s arms tighten around Sungyeol as he returns the kiss, and _yes_. Sungyeol keeps his mouth against Woohyun’s when they come up for air, feeling Woohyun’s fast breaths against his. “Please?” he whispers, and Woohyun would never, ever admit it, but he trembles.

Gotcha. 

Woohyun sucks in some air, presses his eyes closed and mutters something.

“What was that?” Sungyeol prods, careful to make sure he doesn’t sound too teasing. He really is ridiculously curious about this, and if he wants to know, he can’t risk Woohyun going all prickly again.

“Your _legs_ , okay?” Woohyun repeats, impatience covering embarrassment, and okay, _that_ makes sense.

When they were getting ready for “Trouble Maker,” Sungjong had said that he thought Sungyeol had the best legs to pull off a dress and that that was one of the reasons he chose Sungyeol for his partner (not that Sungyeol really believes that, but Sungjong doesn’t give compliments he doesn’t mean). And after the performance, he’d gotten a lot of awkward comments about them from the other guys and a few teasingly appreciative ones from some of his female idol friends. He knows people like long legs, but his are apparently well-shaped, too, even if he’s not such a good judge of guys’ legs. And now that Woohyun mentions it, Sungyeol’s pretty sure he’s noticed Woohyun’s gaze on his leg a couple of times before—maybe especially these last few days when they’ve been bare with the skirts, but before this whole thing started, too.

Oh, this is going to be _fun_. 

Sungyeol tightens his legs around Woohyun’s waist again, squeezing as hard as he can. “These legs?”

“No, the two that are growing out of your forehead, dipshit.” Woohyun’s voice is testy, but Sungyeol can see a bit of strain rising on his face. Excellent. 

Sungyeol pushes Woohyun aside—Woohyun, face crinkling in confusion, lets him, falling onto his side on the bed beside Sungyeol. His questioning eyes are on Sungyeol’s face, but they jerk away, wide, when he sees Sungyeol’s hands falling to the hem of his skirt.

“Sungyeol—“

Sungyeol lifts his hips and drags the skirt slowly down his legs till it reaches his ankles, and then he kicks it off with one flick of his foot, not paying the slightest bit of attention to where it ends up. Not when Woohyun’s staring at Sungyeol’s legs like he can’t believe he’s actually seeing them. 

Sungyeol should feel weird or ashamed or something, lying here on the this bed in nothing but a pair of cheap cotton underwear, but he can’t find any emotions remotely like that when Woohyun’s edging closer to him, eyes drinking in the sight of Sungyeol’s legs.

Sungyeol considers continuing with the little seduction he started, maybe lifting up one of his legs and resting it on Woohyun’s shoulder, but that just seems like too much, and besides, Woohyun doesn’t seem to need any more help, not when he’s moving around to settle himself on the floor on his knees at Sungyeol’s feet. 

One of Woohyun’s hands reaches towards him, and Sungyeol is tensed up in anticipation for his touch when Woohyun suddenly pauses. “Sungyeol,” he says, voice a little raspy, and okay, that’s _hot_. “Can I…?”

“Are you seriously going to ask before you do anything?” Sungyeol asks, exasperated. “Yes, fine, I give you permission!”

“I just don’t want to scare you away, jackass! Do you think I could live with myself if I did anything that made you uncomfortable?” Woohyun snaps.

“Well, nothing you’ve done has made me uncomfortable, so quit being such a pansy about it!”

“Fine!”

“Touch me already!”

“Fine!”

And then Woohyun’s hand slides up the back of Sungyeol’s calf, and Sungyeol isn’t sure if it’s that his legs are more sensitive than he thought or if Woohyun just knows how to touch him or if the past few years of never being touched by anyone in a remotely sexual way is catching up with him, but he gasps at the feeling. And then there’s Woohyun’s other hand, and they’re both sliding up Sungyeol’s legs, and then there’s Woohyun’s lips, pressing against his right ankle, and Woohyun’s voice that Sungyeol feels against his skin almost more than he hears, “Fuck, your legs are criminal, I’ve had so many dreams….”

Hands, stroking and pausing to grip, and then lips, pressing kisses to Sungyeol’s other ankle, to the faint blue of veins on his calves, to the crease of his knee and then more and more kisses as Woohyun works his way higher, climbing up onto the bed now, and with every centimeter Woohyun’s hands and lips move up Sungyeol’s thighs, Sungyeol’s breath hitches a little bit more till he finds that he’s whimpering without knowing just when he started. Woohyun’s lips are only inches away from the juncture of Sungyeol’s thighs, and Sungyeol’s hands scrabble against the bedspread, latching on and bunching it into his hands as he feels the damp of Woohyun’s mouth getting closer and closer to where he’s tingling.

Woohyun pauses just an inch away from the edge of Sungyeol’s underwear, nudging his nose against the soft skin of Sungyeol’s thigh. “Fuck, Sungyeol, I can _smell_ you,” he breathes, and Sungyeol has to stop himself from hitting him.

“If you ask permission to take my underwear off, I swear to God,” he says, voice shrill with strain, “I’ll kick your ass out of this room and send you home to Gyu-hyung with a case of blueballs your hand won’t be able to do anything about.”

Woohyun doesn’t laugh or protest, just bumps his nose right against the damp spot on Sungyeol’s underwear. Sungyeol jumps, tries to cover it up by propping himself up on his elbows and with a question, though his voice probably gives him away. “You can _smell_ me? Is it bad?”

Another nose bump and Sungyeol grips the bedspread harder. “No. It’s not bad. It’s…different.” Woohyun raises his eyes and looks at Sungyeol, and his lips are just barely curved into a smile. “I kind of like it, actually.”

Woohyun’s eyes are so steady on Sungyeol’s face, and it’s so weird for him to be perched between Sungyeol’s legs like that that Sungyeol wants to look away, but he can’t. “You are so weird. Next you’re going to tell me that the smell of my shit is better than perfume, just because it’s mine.”

Woohyun laughs, though maybe there’s a hint of embarrassment lurking in his eyes. “Well, you are a girl at the moment. What did we decide that time we were cleaning the bathroom? That girls don’t even need bathrooms at all because they don’t have all the bodily functions guys do? They live on just a sip of water?”

Sungyeol snorts. “I wish that were true. Then at least there would be advantages to this whole being-female thing.” Woohyun’s smile starts to grow at Sungyeol’s words, and Sungyeol sends him a sharp look. “What the hell are you grinning about?”

“I have heard there’s one advantage to being a woman,” Woohyun says. “I can’t wait to see if it’s true.”

“If what’s—“ But Sungyeol doesn’t get to ask his question because Woohyun’s hands are at Sungyeol’s hips and then they’re easing his panties off, and Sungyeol flushes as he raises his hips just enough to allow it. And then he’s totally naked, and he can feel the cool air against the parts of him he hasn’t let himself consider yet, and Woohyun is looking down at where he’s bare now, and his legs snap together because…because this is just _wrong_ —he has a _dick_ and he’s a _guy_ and why the fuck is this happening to him and why did he think that taking off his clothes with Nam Woohyun of all people was a good idea and now he’s naked and it’s awkward and he doesn’t even like this body because it isn’t _his_ and—

And suddenly Woohyun’s up beside him and slipping his arms around him, pulling him up against him and kissing him, and after a second Sungyeol relaxes into the kiss, letting Woohyun’s lips soothe him just a bit. Woohyun’s bare chest against his still feels good, and the fabric of his jeans, worn soft by so many washings, isn’t too rough against the rest of Sungyeol’s body. This is okay, Woohyun holding him close and kissing him, not looking at him; yeah, this is okay. This is good.

“It hit you just then, didn’t it?” Woohyun asks when they pull apart. 

Sungyeol’s eyes dart away from Woohyun’s face. “Kind of hard to ignore my total lack of a dick when I’m not wearing anything at all,” Sungyeol answers, aiming for light, but his voice cracks more than he would have liked. 

Woohyun doesn’t seem to notice it, though, tugging gently on a lock of hair. “I can leave now, if you want. Or we can put our clothes back on and sleep or something. That would probably be smarter, anyway.”

It probably would be. But there’s something lodged in Sungyeol’s mind and now that he’s calmed down again he notices it. “What were you saying earlier you couldn’t wait for?”

Woohyun blinks. “What?”

“The advantage of being a woman.”

Woohyun flushes. “Forget about that. I can just go—“

“No, what was it?”

“No, it wasn’t anything, don’t worry about it—“

And then Sungyeol realizes what it must have been, and _shit_ , how had he forgotten about that? Multiple orgasms. And Woohyun had wanted to—

Woohyun’s arms are still around him, but he’s gone very still now, maybe waiting for Sungyeol to tell him to leave or something. But Sungyeol is thinking, about how Woohyun had kissed his _ankles_ and Woohyun had asked permission for everything and Woohyun had reached for his stomach and Woohyun had liked his smell, and Sungyeol is in this body now, and it’s different, and he kind of wants to know how, has been curious all along, and he’s the kind who’ll try anything once, and there isn’t anyone else he would trust to try this with him and—

“Do you think you can? Make it good enough that—multiple times?” Sungyeol isn’t the slightest bit prudish, has been accused of being crude, but somehow he can’t quite say this as bluntly as he has other things.

Woohyun looks a little wild-eyed, and Sungyeol knows the shake of his head isn’t denial. “Really, Sungyeol, I know this is a lot for you and—I should go, I should—“

“Are you really going to get me all worked up like that and just leave? Some gentleman you are. I think the lady in the restaurant was right about you.”

Something flashes in Woohyun’s eyes, but Sungyeol can tell he’s still going to protest. “Sungyeol—“

“The other day, in the shower,” Sungyeol says, pulling back a bit so he’s not right up against Woohyun; he’s clearly going to have to take things into his own hands. “I found—and I wanted to see—“

He takes Woohyun’s hand in his, though he can feel the reluctance tensing it, and guides it down between his legs. He starts when he feels Woohyun’s fingers brush against him and _yes_ , this is what he wants.

Woohyun’s voice is throaty. “Sungyeol—“

“I guess that answers the question of whether you can turn me on or not,” Sungyeol jokes as his fingers and Woohyun’s encounter the damp curls. 

Woohyun moans, and Sungyeol can’t tell whether it’s from frustration of the sexual kind or the not-as-fun you-aren’t-listening-to-me type, but it really doesn’t matter. “Sungyeol—“

“Woohyun,” Sungyeol says as firmly as he can when Woohyun’s hands are down _there_. “Do I have to sign a contract or something to get you to believe that I really, really want you to touch me?”

For a moment there’s nothing but silence and Woohyun’s fingers are still and then Woohyun lets out a helpless sigh and buries his face in Sungyeol’s neck.

“I just don’t want you to regret anything.” Sungyeol feels the words vibrate against the skin of his neck.

“Well, if I do, it’s my own fault, since I’m the one making this decision. I’m a grown-up, Woohyun. I can decide that I want this.”

Woohyun still isn’t moving his fingers, still hasn’t raised his head from Sungyeol’s neck. “But it’s so soon and you’re—“

“It’s soon for me,” Sungyeol corrects. “But you’ve been waiting for a long time, haven’t you?” When Woohyun doesn’t reply, Sungyeol sighs and works the fingers of his free hand through Woohyun’s hair. “Okay, so it’s soon. But we’ve known each other for a long time, and I know you better than just about anybody, and I want to know what this is like, and I want to do it with you. So stop worrying so much about whether it’s smart or not and just give me what I want since we both know you want it, too. Okay?”

Woohyun is silent for another long moment, his lips pressed up against a tendon in Sungyeol’s neck, and then he raises his head and he locks eyes with Sungyeol. And then—then his fingers start to move and Sungyeol gasps as they begin to explore, rough-skinned and firm but gentle and just really fucking good, and then, without any guidance from Sungyeol other than little gasps and moans, they find what Sungyeol had found before in the shower and _fuck yes_.

And now there’s no doubt whatsoever about whether Woohyun can turn him on.


	7. Chapter 7

Woohyun’s had a lot of fantasies about Sungyeol. A lot. The subconscious kind his mind conjures up while he’s sleeping that are more about the impression of skin on skin and labored breathing and heat and mouths and rocking motions and nothing is very clear but everything is so hot he can hardly stand it. And the lucid kind when he’s in the shower with the water pounding down on his skin or in bed at night before Sunggyu comes into the room, where he can focus on every detail of Sungyeol, catalogue each thing that makes him so fucking hot: his mouth, his legs, his skin, his collarbones, his hands, his ass, his voice. Everything. In his dreams, Woohyun touches Sungyeol and Sungyeol touches him back (and maybe they say things to each other that are about a lot more than sex, but Woohyun won’t think of that now), and everything is hot and hazy and good.

But this—this is better than anything Woohyun could have dreamed of. Because the reality of it is so sharp and intense—not cloudy around the edges like when he’s dreaming—and there are details that even Woohyun’s waking mind hadn’t anticipated. The raspy sound of Sungyeol breathing so hard against Woohyun’s ear, the damp warmth of his breath and the little whimpers he’s letting out, the impossible softness of Sungyeol’s bare skin pressed up against Woohyun’s and the slight sheen of perspiration that’s rising on it, the smell of Sungyeol more pronounced than ever before with the bit of sweat over his natural scent and then the smell of his arousal around the edges, the brush of Sungyeol’s silky hair against Woohyun’s shoulder and collarbone, the way Sungyeol’s body is undulating against his—just Sungyeol, just everywhere.

It’s so much more than his fantasies ever could have anticipated, but honestly it’s so different he isn’t sure he can compare. Woohyun’s hand is between Sungyeol’s legs, but it’s not grasping Sungyeol’s dick the way (yes, Woohyun can admit it now) he’d imagined before, because there isn’t a dick there at all. Instead, Woohyun’s fingers are sliding in between slippery layers of curl-covered skin and now Woohyun has two fingers _inside_ Sungyeol, inside where it’s hot and wet and tight, so very, very tight (as tight as Woohyun’s jeans are feeling at the moment), and another is rubbing little circles on the button that makes Sungyeol tremble and whine, and Woohyun has just been experimenting, repeating the things that make Sungyeol jolt or moan, and Woohyun isn’t even really sure he knows what he’s doing, only he must, because Sungyeol is moving like that—Sungyeol is _riding his hand_ —and making those sounds and panting and gasping and sometimes he even says—

“Woohyun!” Sungyeol whines, and Woohyun could come just from the sound of Sungyeol’s voice cracking (his _name_ ), so desperate and so close against his ear. He presses his hips against Sungyeol’s leg, because he needs _something_ , some sort of pressure or he’s going to explode, and Sungyeol doesn’t seem to mind. “Fuck, Woohyun!”

“Is that good?” Woohyun manages to ask, even if he thinks he knows the answer already (it _is_ good, it has to be if Sungyeol is moving like this, and holy fuck—Woohyun can turn him on and, yeah, he’s fantasized about this so many times the thought should be worn down to dullness, but it isn’t, because this is _real_ , and _he’s the one making Sungyeol make those sounds_ ). Sungyeol whines again, and Woohyun turns his head so he can see him, and even though Woohyun’s fingers are currently making themselves more than aware of just how not-a-guy Sungyeol’s body is at the moment, the small changes to Sungyeol’s face are still a surprise, almost enough to make Woohyun tense, but no: no, this is Sungyeol: his skin is still so pale, just like it’s always been, except where it’s flushed with arousal; his eyes may have curlier lashes but they’re the same shape and if his pupils hadn’t swallowed the iris they’d be the same color too; his mouth’s a little different, wider and a bit fuller, but the curve of it is exactly the same, though it’s open and panting in a way that Woohyun’s only imagined in his most heated fantasies. There’s still that hint of fullness in his cheeks that he’s never quite managed to lose, and Woohyun can see the glint of the earrings he’s so proud of, and there’s that beauty mark just above his collarbone and one right below it, too, and they look like they need some more attention….

Woohyun feels long fingers tangling in his hair as he bends his head to run his tongue over the little dots. “Is that good, Yeol?” he asks after.

Woohyun’s fingers falter when he feels the sharp yank of his hair, but one impatient whine from Sungyeol and he starts up the rhythm again.

“You know it is, you smug ass,” Sungyeol pants as Woohyun runs his tongue along the hollow of his collarbones. “You just want to gloat when I tell you.”

 _That’s not it at all, and you know it, Lee Sungyeol._ But Woohyun lifts his head and presses a kiss to Sungyeol’s pouty lips, grinning as he does. “Well, it’s always nice to know your work is appreciated.”

Sungyeol rolls his eyes, but then Woohyun speeds up his fingers and Sungyeol moans and tosses his head back, a few sweat-damp locks of hair sticking to his neck and cheeks. He looks so fucking amazing (so much like himself and yet so different) that Woohyun can’t handle looking at him, so he bows his head again, this time seeking out Sungyeol’s breasts. 

Sungyeol’s fingers tighten in Woohyun’s hair again. “Woohyun?”

Even through the whine it sounds like a question this time, so Woohyun releases Sungyeol’s nipple without pulling back at all, nose bumping against soft skin as he breathes in the scent of Sungyeol. “Yeah, Yeol?”

“If I—if I—“ Woohyun slows down his fingers to let Sungyeol concentrate more, but Sungyeol nudges him hard with his ankle, so he starts up again, grinning a little—he should have known that Sungyeol would be greedy in bed. “If I—right now—I can still—later? Soon?” 

There definitely isn’t a full sentence in that gasped-out string of words, but Woohyun understands nonetheless. “That’s what I hear,” he says, tonguing around Sungyeol’s other areola, causing Sungyeol’s back to bow.

“Yeah, me, too, but—God,” Sungyeol gasps, his body still moving with Woohyun’s fingers. “It’s awesome being a girl.”

Woohyn snorts a laugh against Sungyeol’s chest, feeling Sungyeol twitch against him at the sensation. “Earlier you were saying it sucked.”

“Yeah, well—fuck, Woohyun—that was before—“ Another intake of breath as Woohyun takes a nipple into his mouth. “—before I realized all the— _shit_ —implications.”

Woohyun has to pull back a bit to laugh again, making Sungyeol gasp at the way his breath fans against his sensitive skin. “It must be compensation for all the shitty stuff—childbirth and PMS and—“

“And jerks who won’t leave you alone at the mall,” Sungyeol finishes in his breathy voice, and Woohyun laughs again. 

“Yeah, definitely.” 

“So why don’t— _yeah_ —why don’t all women get them?” Sungyeol shakes his hair out of his face again. “You hear them complain and—“

“Probably because they sleep with assholes who won’t spend some actual time taking care of them,” Woohyun answers, wondering how anyone could _not_ want to take care of a woman—or man—they wanted to be with.

“All women should have as many of them as they want a day,” Sungyeol says, and he sounds so adamant about it that Woohyun grins and gives him another good suck, coaxing another moan in punctuation.

“You should run for office. On that platform, I’m pretty sure you’ll get every female vote in the country.” Woohyun’s fingers are beginning to feel a bit stiff and cramped, but it doesn’t matter, because really that’s just a sign he should be moving on.

Sungyeol’s head, which had been tossed back as he rode Woohyun’s hand, flies back down when he notices Woohyun moving down his body. Woohyun glances up at the motion and sees that Sungyeol’s eyes are watching him, and he isn’t sure if what’s showing in them is fear or nervousness or anticipation or something else altogether.

“Are you going to…?” Sungyeol asks, trailing off, and his cheeks are already so flushed that Woohyun can only suspect without any real confirmation that he’s blushing now.

“You don’t want me to?” Woohyun asks, because that seems crazy to him—someone’s mouth is always one of the best things in the world, and Sungyeol had just been going on about how all women need as many orgasms as they want.

Woohyun’s almost positive he’s not imagining the hint of tentativeness in Sungyeol’s eyes. “I didn’t get the bikini wax,” he says, and even though his voice is throaty, Woohyun can tell he’s trying to sound like he’s joking. He doesn’t do a very good job of it, and it makes Woohyun a little sick to his stomach. 

“You’ve been watching too much porn,” he informs Sungyeol. “I don’t care about that.”

Sungyeol shifts, probably hoping it comes across as just a reaction to Woohyun’s fingers, which are still moving—if not as fast as before—but it doesn’t. “Wouldn’t it be better if…?”

“No.” Woohyun’s not messing around with this. “It wouldn’t be better. It would be different, I mean, if you really wanted to, but I know you didn’t sound too thrilled earlier at the idea of hot wax and hair-ripping.” Sungyeol winces, glancing away. “You should add a plank to your platform, Yeol: that women should do whatever they want down there and still get all the orgasms they want anyway. Right?” Sungyeol snorts a laugh, and Woohyun nudges him with his shoulder. “If you really had the opportunity to be with a girl you were really into, would you let something like that bother you?”

“I’m not going to be with any girl,” Sungyeol says, and maybe that bit of a smirk means he knows exactly what he’s doing saying it, distracting Woohyun from the current topic. “I chose you, remember?”

Even with the smirk, Woohyun’s insides knot themselves into ribbons when Sungyeol says things like that, though he can’t let himself think about it too much right now; it’s too _much_. “Does that mean you’re refusing my offer?”

“No! I mean—yeah, I’d like—do you really want to?”

In answer, Woohyun slides all the way down till he can watch what his fingers are doing, and he sees the muscles of Sungyeol’s thighs twitch when his breath ghosts against him. The smell is unique, but Woohyun wasn’t lying when he said he kind of liked it, and maybe it’s just because it’s Sungyeol, but maybe not. He grips one of Sungyeol’s thighs—because it’s _right there_ and how can he not touch what he’s been fantasizing about for forever? Male or female, Sungyeol has the best pair of legs Woohyun has ever seen—smoothing his thumb over the skin, and then he leans in.

“Fuck!” The word comes out of Sungyeol’s mouth so garbled Woohyun can barely recognize it, but the helplessness of it tells Woohyun all he needs to know. He moves his tongue around experimentally, and the taste, again, is different, but it’s definitely not bad—not salty like a guy’s is (which he only knows from that one curiosity-driven taste of his own). And even if it were, Woohyun’s not sure he would pull away, not when Sungyeol is making those noises and moving that way. Fuck, _yeah_.

He presses his hips down against the mattress, thankful that this bed is so hotel-size huge; his jeans are way too tight for comfort, but he doesn’t let that distract him. Fingers and tongue working together, he uses what he’s learned so far to make Sungyeol whimper and moan, Sungyeol’s legs sometimes moving restlessly against the tangled sheets of the bed, his back sometimes bowing. 

“Fuck, Woohyun—your _mouth_ ,” Sungyeol gasps, voice cracking, and the sound of it is so sexy—so _Sungyeol_ that Woohyun jerks his hips down again against the bed below him, taking a deep breath before diving back in.

He doesn’t stay there long, though, because he remembers something, something he’d read in one of Sunggyu’s books (his hyung has the weirdest reading habits, honestly). Sungyeol lets out a pitiful whine when Woohyun pulls his mouth away, but Woohyun keeps his fingers in place, releasing Sungyeol’s thigh to wipe at his chin.

“What’re you _doing_?” Sungyeo moans. “Are you trying to torture me?”

Woohyun reaches over and grabs one of Sungyeol’s hands where it’s bunching the sheets. “Try this—it’ll make it better,” he instructs, leading the hand to Sungyeol’s chest. Sungyeol gives him a skeptical look, but Woohyun just rolls his eyes. “Don’t even pretend you don’t like to play with tits, pabo,” he says, and then he moves back down between Sungyeol’s legs.

But he pauses again, and the words are out of his mouth before he really thinks about them. “Tell me what it feels like.”

Sungyeol, who’d been lazily toying with his nipples, freezes. “What?”

Woohyun’s ears are burning a bit, but he forces the next words out. “You’re in a girl’s body. I’ll never know what that feels like—well, probably not. I want to know.”

Sungyeol narrows his eyes at him. “Is this just a way to get me to do dirty talk?”

Now the back of Woohyun’s neck is hot, too, but he ignores it. “It doesn’t have to be dirty. I just really want to know.” And he does. Maybe not enough to want to experience what it’s like to be a girl himself, but he wants to know about this, not just because the differences have to be fascinating, but because this is something Sungyeol’s going through, and Woohyun is always interested in that.

But he knows how Sungyeol gets if he’s pushed, so he just leans forward and licks where he knows Sungyeol’s clitoris is. “’s it good?” he murmurs, hoping Sungyeol will take the prompt and run with it.

He doesn’t at first, just breathing in and out, fast and raspy as Woohyun goes back to coaxing him again. Finally, after a few minutes, he pants, “The bottoms of my feet are burning.”

That’s a new one. “Yeah?” Woohyun asks when he comes up for breath. “What else?”

Sungyeol makes him wait again, sliding his fingers into Woohyun’s hair, nails scraping against his scalp, but Woohyun doesn’t mind, tongue and fingers and lips busy at work. And the rawness of Sungyeol’s voice when he continues is worth the wait. “When I play with my tits, I can feel it down—fucking hell, Woohyun!”

Oh, so he likes that. Woohyun smiles against the wet curls, pulls back just enough to prompt, “You can feel it down here?”

“Like there are ripples down below my stomach you like so much,” Sungyeol clarifies, voice rasping. God, no one has ever been so hot. Woohyun realizes he’s been humping the bed, but it seems so unimportant compared to what Sungyeol is feeling. Woohyun focuses all of his attention on Sungyeol—he can feel twitching, he knows Sungyeol is close to the edge, and when Sungyeol speaks next—gasps next—it’s confirmed.

“Woohyun—Woohyun— _fuck_!”

There’s twitching and pulsing against Woohyun’s fingers and tongue, and on either side of him, Sungyeol’s fucking amazing legs bend at the knee as Sungyeol’s feet slide helplessly along the bed. Woohyun can’t get a good look—especially not with Sungyeol’s fingers yanking at his hair that way—but he knows that Sungyeol’s back is bowing as he lets out a gasping groan. He thinks Sungyeol is trying to say something, but there aren’t any words coming out of his mouth, just desperate sounds, and the only thing that could possibly make this better (Sungyeol said his _name_ ) is if Woohyun could see his face as this is happening but—but that’ll be later. For now, there’s this, Sungyeol’s body wracked with pleasure and Woohyun drawing it out as long as he can.

Woohyun has no idea how long it lasts, but Sungyeol finally collapses against the bed, groaning, his fingers flexing in Woohyun’s hair. The sound of him sucking in oxygen is somehow really sexy, and so is the way his knees fall apart limply. Woohyun slows down his touches a little but doesn’t pull back.

“Woohyun,” Sungyeol finally rasps (and he’s saying Woohyun’s _name_ ), “that was—“

 _Not over yet_ , Woohyun thinks, determined to show Sungyeol just what this body can do. 

“Woohyun, what’re you—“ Sungyeol’s voice cuts off in a moan as Woohyun picks up speed again, coaxing out a rhythm again with his fingers and mouth. Yes, he’s going to make this happen.

The smell, the taste of Sungyeol is richer now, muskier, as though something new has been released, and Woohyun knows that it has. His tongue and fingers are beginning to get tired now, his lips a bit numb, and there’s the ever-pressing problem between his own legs, but none of that matters. _Sungyeol_.

“Are you really going to—“ Sungyeol seems incapable of finishing a sentence, especially not when Woohyun gives an extra hard suck to show him just how really he’s going to do this.

 _If I just keep going—_

It takes another minute or two—or maybe even longer, time is irrelevant at this point (he’s dreamed of being between Sungyeol’s legs for the longest time, and even if it’s different now, somehow it isn’t)—but then there’s the sharpness of Sungyeol’s gasp and the squeezing around him and then Sungyeol’s fingers are back, tugging again at Woohyun’s hair, and _yes_.

This one doesn’t last as long, but it takes Sungyeol longer to recover afterwards. “Two,” Sungyeol announces finally as Woohyun slowly strokes and caresses him down from his high, sounding more dazed that Woohyun has ever heard him.

 _Not just two._ Woohyun has always been an overachiever, and there isn’t anything he can’t do if he’s willing to work hard enough at it. And he always works hard at things he cares about.

 _Sungyeol_.

Sungyeol yanks so hard on Woohyun’s hair that he actually pulls his face away when Woohyun picks up the rhythm again. “What the fuck are you doing?” This is the first time Woohyun has gotten a good look at Sungyeol’s face, and it’s flushed, hair clinging to it with sweat, eyes bigger and darker than Woohyun has ever seen them, mouth a questioning circle. He’s so fucking gorgeous.

“It’s ‘multiple’ orgasms, not ‘a couple of orgasms,’” Woohyun informs him before pulling his hair free and diving back down. 

But Sungyeol just groans, flopping his head from side to side against the pillow as he protests, “No, no, no more Woohyun, it’s too much, it’s too—Woohyun, I can’t—it’s too—“

The one thing Woohyun hates most to hear is Sungyeol saying ‘no;’ in the moment when Sungyeol had thrown Woohyun’s words about not having to listen because he’s a girl back into his face, Woohyun had sworn that he would always, always listen to what Sungyeol says. He’s always tried to do that before with girls, too, because that’s just what a good man does, but he’d never been so aware of how important it was until he heard Sungyeol say it like that. So he pulls back immediately, resting his chin on Sungyeol’s pubic bone and looking up the length of his body—all that pale, flawless skin now flushed and sweaty ( _and I did that_ ). 

Sungyeol actually does look a little miserable, wrung out but so fucking sexy, that Woohyun would give this up immediately if he didn’t know for a fact that this would work. “Do you trust me?” he asks, because he really wants to give Sungyeol this, really wants to show him everything this body is capable of. That’s what Sungyeol wants, isn’t it? That’s what he’d said?

Sungyeol holds his eyes for a moment, even though his own are a bit hazy, and then his gorgeous mouth twists up a bit (the bottom lip is darker now, probably from biting it, and somehow that’s really hot), and he says, “I’m alone in a hotel room with you and I’m naked. And a _girl_. You do the math.”

Woohyun smiles, press a kiss with his tender lips to a spot low on Sungyeol’s abdomen. “Then do you believe me when I tell you this will be awesome if you just go with it?”

Again, Sungyeol holds his gaze and finally he sighs. “I shouldn’t have told you that you’ll be able to make me fall in love with you. You’re going to try so hard it’ll kill you, just like you do with everything.”

Woohyun grins, knowing agreement when he hears it, and then he’s back down at Sungyeol’s opening, fingers and mouth reinvigorated. _You’ll like it, Yeol, I swear._

Sungyeol whimpers as Woohyun picks up the rhythm again, and from the corner of his eye, Woohyun can see those long, pretty fingers twitching against the bedsheets. When the next wave hits, the whimpers turn into something like a whine, and Woohyun can tell by the way Sungyeol’s hands are flexing that he isn’t quite sure whether it’s pain or pleasure. Woohyun brings him down from it, pulls back his mouth—but not still his fingers—just long enough to say, “Now it’ll be all good, I swear, we’re past that now.”

And they are. The next one is so easy to coax out—the book had been right; all you need is persistence, just keep going; Woohyun has no idea why so many guys can’t figure that out—and the one after that even easier, and the long, keening moan Sungyeol lets loose at each doesn’t have the slightest bit of pain in it. The fingers in Woohyun’s hair loosen a bit with each arrival, and Woohyun can tell that each one in the string of orgasms is a little bit smaller than the one before, and finally there’s one that’s almost nothing but a few shudders, and Sungyeol is falling back onto the bed again and when his fingers tug at Woohyun’s hair—with barely any energy this time—Woohyun eases him down with a few more caresses, then pulls back and, wiping his mouth, crawls up Sungyeol’s body to look down at his face.

Woohyun has accomplished a lot in his life, so much that, yeah, he’d dreamed of, but so much more than his more practical side (yes, he has one) had really imagined possible at this young of an age. He’s sung in foreign countries on stages in front of thousands of fans screaming for him, he’s stood in front of television cameras and received awards like his heroes, he’s worked damn hard for all of it and even if he’s not satisfied—even if he always wants more, believes he can _have_ more, that he needs to _do_ more—he’s proud. But right now, looking down at Sungyeol’s eyes so cloudy with afterglow, his body laying limp and flushed and sweaty and beautiful in the aftermath of his pleasure, Woohyun thinks maybe he’s never been more proud of anything.

Sungyeol lays there for a long time, just breathing hard and staring up at Woohyun with eyes that Woohyun can’t read (but that make that newborn thing inside him stretch its wings). Woohyun has seen him almost collapsing from exhaustion after eighteen straight hours of dance practice, but he’s never seen him quite like this ( _quite this beautiful_ ).

Then Sungyeol reaches out, and with a weak hand pressed against the back of Woohyun’s neck, pulls him down for a kiss. He makes a quiet, curious sound at the taste—probably just realizing that it’s himself he’s tasting—and even his mouth seems worn out and lazy, but he lets Woohyun kiss him thoroughly and it’s a really fucking good kiss.

Sungyeol blinks at him for a moment when they part, and then, in a raw voice, he says, “What the fuck was that?”

Woohyun thinks maybe Sungyeol expects his grin to be smug, but instead it’s just wide. “That was multiple orgasms, Yeol.”

“Holy shit, we should all be ruled by queens if that’s what women are capable of. Their bodies can do that _and_ they can have kids? Why aren’t they ruling the world?”

Woohyun’s grin only widens. “Maybe because they’re all tired like you are right now after they do either one of those things?”

Sungyeol’s laugh is short and breathy, and it’s just so Sungyeol that Woohyun can’t help but kiss him again, no matter how tender his own lips are. 

“C’mere,” Sungyeol says after, tugging on Woohyun’s arm till he drops down beside him.

“Oh, so, _now_ you want to cuddle? You? Lee Sungyeol?”

“Shut up, dickhead, I’m too tired to move and it’s weird with you being above me like that, I just want you out of my face.” But he lets Woohyun pull him to him, lying pliant in his arms in a way that makes something in Woohyun’s heart ache with something that isn’t pain.

“I can’t believe you still have your pants on,” Sungyeol notes, hand drifting down to tug on a belt loop and then—

“Shit,” Sungyeol curses as Woohyun gasps—even the brush of Sungyeol’s hand against him is too much. “I forgot all about you.” Woohyun snorts a laugh, but Sungyeol smacks his arm. “I was a little bit distracted, you ass.”

“I’m pretty distracting, aren’t I?” Woohyun asks, smiling toothily (and proudly), and he doesn’t even try to stop the next smack.

“Egomaniacs are always distracting. You should take your pants off, let’s do something about that,” Sungyeol commands.

“It’s okay, I can take care of it myself,” Woohyun says, because Sungyeol is exhausted and probably wants nothing more than to fall asleep. 

“Are you trying to be some sort of martyr-like perfect boyfriend? Because this part of it’s going to get annoying. Though you can do that first part whenever you want.”

Something twists inside of Woohyun at the word ‘boyfriend,’ but he just shakes his head. “Seriously, Yeol, I know you’re tired and—“

“Besides, we haven’t fucked yet.”

Woohyun’s arms go still around Sungyeol’s body and Woohyun sucks in a breath. Sungyeol cranes his head, sweaty hair moving with the motion, and eyes him. “What, you think we’re not going to do that, too?”

“Sungyeol, we’re moving really fast and—“

“And I already told you I wanted to try this with you. Seriously? I know this much about girls: there’s no better time to do it than just now because I’m as ready down there for my first time as I’m ever going to be.”

“Sungyeol—“

“Are you refusing freely offered pussy? Seriously? And you say you like girls, too. I’d started to actually believe it earlier when you went down on me for forever, but now I think—”

“What if you get pregnant?”

Sungyeol’s mouth shuts with a click, his eyes suddenly clear and wide. He blinks. And then blinks again. And then he pulls back his fist and slams it into Woohyun’s bicep as hard as he can.

“Ow! What the hell, Ye—“

“Don’t ever say that again, what the _fuck_ , what is your _problem_ , are you trying to make sure I’ll never be able to sleep again, that’s _disgusting_ , I’m a guy, you degenerate!”

Woohyun rubs his arm and glares back. “Well, somebody has to think about it! It’s not like we’ve got condoms or something!”

And then something flutters in Sungyeol’s eyes and Woohyun’s jaw drops.

“You do _not_.”

Sungyeol shifts uncomfortably, looking away. “It’s just one.”

“You do _not_.”

“In my wallet, just in case—better safe than sorry—“

“Lee Sungyeol, you do _not_.”

“Stop saying that, you dick! It’s just one!”

And then Woohyun throws his head back and laughs, laughs so hard that he falls back on the bed and Sungyeol yanks himself out of his arms with a glare. “It’s not that funny,” he says testily, but Woohyun is still laughing.

“Oh, yes, it is!” Woohyun manages between gasps. “When was the last time any of us was alone with a girl—it was _years_ ago—you haven’t even kissed anyone since your drama and that didn’t even count and you carry one in your _wallet_ oh my God you’re so ridiculous when did you think you’d actually need it I cannot believe you—Lee Sungyeol, you _would_.”

“Just two seconds ago you were saying I didn’t!” Sungyeol snaps.

“That’s because sometimes it’s hard to believe how _you_ you are!”

“What the fuck does that mean?” Sungyeol demands over the sound of Woohyun’s laughing.

“I love you so fucking much.”

Woohyun’s laughter dies just as quickly as Sungyeol’s eyes go huge and _fuck_ , he hadn’t meant to say that, hadn’t meant to say it at all, it had just slipped out and now everything’s going to be uncomfortable, because, sure, maybe he’d hinted at it, wanting Sungyeol to know that his feelings were deep and sincere so he’d know that he wasn’t just playing with him, but the word ‘love’ is an entirely different thing altogether and _saying_ it and….

Woohyun’s thoughts fizzle out, like his mind can’t process this, and he closes his eyes because he just can’t look at Sungyeol looking at him like that, and for just a moment everything is very, very still and so silent—Woohyun hadn’t noticed how quiet this hotel room is up until this moment—and it feels too much in this closed room, musky with the scent of sweat and sex, like it’s all clogging up with awkwardness. Fuck. _Fuck_.

He feels a hand pushing against his shoulder and _of course_ , of course Sungyeol wants to kick him out now, this has all become too much and Woohyun doesn’t really blame him—but then the hand keeps pushing until Woohyun falls onto his back onto the bed and he opens his eyes just in time to see Sungyeol—Sungyeol, naked in a girl’s body, still flushed with everything he just allowed Woohyun to give him—swing a leg over him and then stretch himself out on Woohyun’s chest.

Woohyun’s mind stutters to a stop again because Sungyeol is lying stretched out on top of him and his skin feels so good and his hair is tumbling down around them and his eyes are _right there_ and—

“Yeah?” Sungyeol says, and Woohyun swallows hard.

“Yeah.”

“Hmm,” Sungyeol says, and Woohyun has no idea what that means, so he just stares at Sungyeol, wild eyed.

Sungyeol taps a long finger against Woohyun’s bare shoulder. “Okay,” he says, and then he puts his hands, one on top of the other, on Woohyun’s chest and rests his chin on them, just looking at him.

Woohyun is still all tensed up, expecting Sungyeol to blow up in his face at any moment, but no matter how warily he eyes Sungyeol, Sungyeol’s gaze doesn’t waver. After a moment, Woohyun relaxes just a little bit.

“What does that mean?” he asks finally, because he can’t not.

Sungyeol shrugs, not moving from his position, and his long hair shifts around his shoulders. “I can’t say it back yet—well, I mean, I can, but not the way you mean it, and you got so angry earlier when I said I liked you since we meant it in different ways, so I’m not saying anything.”

Oh.

Well.

Okay.

But he can’t help it—

“Yet?” Woohyun’s kind of ashamed of how small his voice is, especially when a gummy grin breaks out across Sungyeol’s face.

“You’re so easy,” Sungyeol says, pulling a hand out from under his chin and reaching up to flick Woohyun in the middle of the forehead.

“Ow! Why do you keep _doing_ that?”

“You know,” Sungyeol says conversationally, as though Woohyun hadn’t asked anything at all. “Most guys just say ‘I love you’ to girls to get them to sleep with them.”

Woohyun rolls his eyes; he knows exactly where this is going. “Sungyeol—“

“Except I already told you I wanted to, and you were being a baby about it. But now aren’t you, like, contractually obligated to go through with it?”

“That is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”

“Woohyun! Come on!”

Sungyeol is actually _whining_ about this, and sometimes Woohyun can’t believe how Sungyeol Sungyeol is.

So he pulls Sungyeol up for a kiss, and this time Sungyeol kisses him eagerly, and that one little word— _yet_ —is bouncing around inside his head and Sungyeol feels so good against him and his pants are still uncomfortably tight and they have a condom….

Something must show on his face when the kiss is over because Sungyeol’s eyes light up a bit. “Great. My wallet’s on the table over there, go get it.”

“Excuse me?”

Sungyeol waves a dismissive hand. “I don’t think my legs work anymore, and I’m too tired to go get it.”

“It’s your wallet.”

“It goes on your dick.”

“I just got you off like a zillion times and you can’t even go over and get the condom?”

“Better get used to it—you’re gonna be the one to do all the work once you get it on.”

“Why should I do the work? I did all the work before, too!”

“Well, that just makes sense, doesn’t it? Leader always says I’m lazy and that you’re the hardworking one, so what do you expect?”

Woohyun shudders. “Please never, ever bring up hyung while we’re naked. Ever again. Ever.”

Sungyeol smacks him on the shoulder again. “Are you going to go get it or not?”

“It really ruins the mood, I cannot even tell you, just the thought of his beady little eyes and—“

“Go get the fucking condom!” Sungyeol yells, though Woohyun notices he’s fighting a grin and he hasn’t made any sort of move to get off of him yet.

“God, how can you be so demanding and so lazy at the same time?” Woohyun grouses, taking Sungyeol by the hips and steering him down onto the bed; he forces himself upright and pads over to the table, wincing at the tightness of his jeans as he goes. There’s Sungyeol’s wallet, and yeah—inside in a pocket with a bunch of business cards and old subway cards and receipts and things is a silver package. Woohyun can’t help but snort.

“You might as well take those off now,” Sungyeol says, pointing to Woohyun’s pants when he turns around. Feeling suddenly a little self-conscious ( _this is **Sungyeol** and I told him I **love** him_ )—which makes no sense since Sungyeol’s seen him naked lots of times before—he hesitates, but Sungyeol just cocks an eyebrow at him—well, cocks part of a eyebrow, anyway, since that’s all he has, and normally Woohyun would make a joke about it, but he’s about to take his pants off so now is not the time to start a round about each others’ physical deficiencies (Woohyun still feels like he carries around those extra pounds with him even if he knows he doesn’t). 

Sungyeol, the jerk, doesn’t turn away when Woohyun’s hands go to the button of his jeans or when he pulls them down or when he takes off his boxers. His eyes stay steady on Woohyun the whole time, and though that look in his eyes isn’t the look he gets when he’s checking out a hot girl (Woohyun knows what that looks like), there’s something appreciative there that makes Woohyun nearly trip as he kicks his boxers off.

“Woohyun?”

“Yeah?”

“Come here.”

 

 

Sungyeol is tired. Wrung-out, exhausted—sleepy, even. Those orgasms— _multiple_ —that Woohyun had lured out of him had felt as though he was drawing out every bit of pleasure lurking in Sungyeol’s body, wringing him out until he’d felt each drop of it and there was nothing left. It had been amazing—maybe the most fucking amazing thing he’s ever experienced—but it had been a _lot_. He’d have been more than content to just fall asleep (maybe in Woohyun’s arms, but he’d never, ever admit that) and sleep for a couple of weeks or until his body decides it wants to work again. But then he’d seen the way Woohyun’s eyes went wide when he’d accidentally brushed the hardness in his jeans, and after that, Sungyeol was intent on actually having sex. Right then.

He’s even more intent on it now, with Woohyun finally stripping off the last of his clothes and coming back towards him, climbing up onto the bed and tossing the condom onto a pillow before pulling Sungyeol up to him and kissing him deep again. Woohyun has a really great body—he should, after the suicidally large amount of work he puts into it—and though Sungyeol’s never really thought about it in sexual terms before, right now he really, really is. Because he can feel the heat of Woohyun’s erection nudge his stomach—the stomach Woohyun is ludicrously hung up on—and he’s still a bit damp between his legs and he knows that now is a good time to do this. It might hurt—will hurt tomorrow, if what he’s heard has any truth in it—but he does want to do this, in this body, and with Woohyun.

Woohyun who _loves_ him. Sungyeol isn’t letting himself think too much about that; it’s too much to process really. He’d suspected it, suspected it from the moment Woohyun had resisted him when he’d tried to kiss him—and then yielded, opening his mouth to Sungyeol’s tongue like he thought that’s what he was born to do—felt even more so each time Woohyun touches him. But to hear it is a different thing, and it’s _Woohyun_ and they’re bandmates and—

And it’s all a lot to handle. But the thing is, that’s why Sungyeol is doing this. Because Woohyun loves him, and Sungyeol believes him, and somehow this makes this okay. Because it means that Woohyun isn’t doing this because Sungyeol is a hot girl or because he’s sexually frustrated or for any other reason other than he really, really wants to—with _Sungyeol_. Sungyeol isn’t really the type to only have sex when there’s emotions involved—he’s always thought he’d sleep with any willing girl he was attracted to, as long as it won’t hurt Infinite—but somehow being in this body makes it different, makes him vulnerable, makes him need to be _sure_. Not because he’s a girl; it’s nothing as simple as that. But because he’s not _him_ , but he still _is_ , and both of those facts are so, so important, and there’s no one else in the world Sungyeol would trust to understand both of them but Woohyun. Because Woohyun loves him.

And no, Sungyeol doesn’t love him back, though he’s beginning to think his half-teasing words that Woohyun could make him just might be true, not just because Woohyun gave him the most amazing string of orgasms Sungyeol is pretty sure the world has ever seen, but because Woohyun is…Woohyun. He’s funny and smarter than most people give him credit for and really loyal and the hardest worker Sungyeol has ever known and he just wants to make people happy, everyone, all the time—but especially Sungyeol. Woohyun is…pretty fucking amazing, really. 

And right now Sungyeol wants to have sex with him for exactly that reason, and maybe that should seem crazy, but at the moment it seems like the most necessary thing in the world. 

Not breaking the kiss, he reaches down between them and takes Woohyun in his hand, and Woohyun moans and it’s kind of hot, and yet it’s weird, another guy’s dick in his hand because the shape and size isn’t like his at all, but at the same time it feels just the same. Kind of like how driving any new type of car is different from any other, even if all the rules are the same, and okay, so Sungyeol hasn’t actually passed his driving test yet, but he definitely will the next time he has some free time. 

“What did you mean about me doing all the work?” Woohyun mumbles, burying his face in Sungyeol’s neck. Sungyeol feels the brush of Woohyun’s breath on his skin and it makes him shiver; this body is _ridiculous_ : it just had more orgasms than any one person should be able to deal with, but it’s already ready to go again. 

Well, part of him is. The rest of him is still really tired.

“I’m too worn out to get creative,” Sungyeol says. “Just…missionary this time. We can try something else out later.”

He feels Woohyun freeze in his arms, knows he’s paralyzed at the implication that there will be other times, and Sungyeol kind of wants to roll his eyes at him because hasn’t he been paying any attention at all? Sungyeol had meant what he said about choosing.

“Missionary’s good,” Woohyun says after a moment, and Sungyeol seeks out his lips again. Strange, how kissing Woohyun now seems like the most natural thing in the world where a few hours ago just the brush of Woohyun’s mouth against his had seemed like the most painful thing in the world—and a few hours before that he’d never even _thought_ of their mouths being anywhere near each other unless they were playing the pass-the-paper game.

Sungyeol keeps kissing him, pausing sometimes to scatter kisses and sucks across his neck and collarbones. Sometime, he thinks, he’d like to explore Woohyun’s body the way Woohyun has explored his—to really pay attention to a guy’s body (to _Woohyun’s_ body) in a way he’s only ever done with girls. But not right now, not when he’s still half-limp with weariness. Now he just kisses Woohyun and pumps his hand, stealing down sometimes to cup Woohyun’s balls, and fuck, that should be strange, but somehow he can’t seem to pay attention to the strangeness anymore when Woohyun is groaning in his ear.

But then:

“What the fuck are you doing now?” Sungyeol demands as Woohyun pulls back, removing Sungyeol’s hand from his erection and starting to slide down Sungyeol’s body.

Woohyun looks up at him, giving him an expression that clearly says he thinks Sungyeol is an idiot. “I have to make sure you’re ready, pabo. You don’t want it to hurt more than it has to.”

Sungyeol snorts. “I really don’t think it’s going to take all that much.”

And it doesn’t. It isn’t long before Woohyun’s fingers and tongue spur him back to ready wetness, especially not when Sungyeol starts playing with his nipples. That had felt weird at first, touching himself like that, but now it just feels like the thing to do—it feels really good, just like every single thing Woohyun has done. When Woohyun doesn’t show any sign of surfacing, Sungyeol reaches out and tugs on his hair again. “Come back up here.”

Woohyun does as he’s told, kissing Sungyeol again when he reaches him, and letting him taste himself again. It isn’t a bad taste, though Sungyeol isn’t sure how crazy he is about it either. He prefers the flavor of Woohyun’s mouth, at any rate.

Sungyeol reaches out and grabs the condom, ripping open the foil and passing the rubber to Woohyun. Woohyun glances at him as though to make sure Sungyeol really means it, and when Sungyeol rolls his eyes, he rolls it on.

Sungyeol, meanwhile, stretches himself a little, wriggling around on the clammy sheets, and when Woohyun moves over him, he loops his arms over Woohyun’s shoulders. “This could hurt,” Woohyun warns, eyes serious as he looks down at Sungyeol. “And it definitely will tomorrow.”

Sungyeol shrugs. There’s a part of him that appreciates how careful Woohyun is being about all of this, how considerate, but there’s another part of him that just wants to get going. “I hurt almost every morning when I wake up from all the dance practice we do. It’ll be way better to hurt because of this.”

Woohyun gives him another searching look and then a long kiss, and then Sungyeol feels something prodding at his opening. 

“Just do it fast,” he says when they pull apart. 

One of Woohyun’s hands comes up to cup his breast and he lowers his mouth for another kiss, and then he pushes inside. 

Sungyeol does feel something give. There’s barely a prick of pain to it, though, because he’s ready, he’s ready for this, Woohyun had made sure of that, and _he’s_ sure, because right now what he wants more than anything else in the world is Woohyun.

And Woohyun is inside him now. Not moving, because of course he isn’t—Woohyun is a gentleman, as much as the thought makes Sungyeol laugh—though Sungyeol can feel the way the muscles of Woohyun’s shoulders are strained as he holds himself in check. And that’s good, because Sungyeol needs a moment, a moment to adjust. No, there really isn’t any pain, not yet, but there is a _stretch_ , not to mention a fullness that’s something entirely new. He can’t imagine how painful this would be if he hadn’t been ready, if Woohyun hadn’t made sure he was. But this, this doesn’t hurt at all, for all it feels like so _much_.

“Yeol, are you—“

Woohyun’s voice is so strained that Sungyeol has to reach up and press a kiss to his lips. “I’m fine, Woohyun. I’m good.”

Woohyun’s face is still taut, though, and it’s clear that he’s not going to make the first move, so Sungyeol does instead, experimentally moving his hips and from the gasp Woohyun lets out and the look on his face, Woohyun really likes it.

“You can move, too, you know,” Sungyeol says, and Woohyun finally does. 

It’s gentle, too gentle at first, and that’s really nice and everything—Sungyeol appreciates what Woohyun’s trying to do for him—but it isn’t enough, so he moves his own hips more, and Woohyun finally starts moving into a deeper rhythm, one that’s really good. 

Woohyun’s eyes are so dark and….something as they look down at him that Sungyeol can’t quite hold them, so he closes his, arching his neck a little as Woohyun moves inside him.

“Is it—“

“It’s good, Woohyun,” Sungyeol reassures him, because it is. It’s really, really different than earlier—that fullness seems to make everything different—and the pleasure isn’t nearly as much as it is when Woohyun was using his mouth and fingers—but it feels really good when Woohyun’s dick moves through him and he really, really likes the way Woohyun’s breath is coming out so labored and the small noises he’s starting to make.

“Is it good for you?” Sungyeol would never have thought that’d want to hear it, but somehow the words come out and he finds he wants to know.

Woohyun makes a sound that’s half-laugh, half-groan, and it makes Sungyeol’s fingers tingle as they play with the hair at the nape of Woohyun’s neck. “It’s so fucking good, Yeol—“

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. God, you’re tight and—“

“And?” It seems he’s going to have to prompt Woohyun to keep talking, to not get too distracted, but he somehow needs to; the words, even just these few so far, seem directly connected to his pleasure in a way he hadn’t ever anticipated, making everything just _better_.

Woohyun’s voice is so raspy Sungyeol can barely make out the words, but it’s really, really hot, and that’s even before Sungyeol thinks about the words he’s saying: “Fucking hell, Yeol, I’m inside you.”

Fucking hell is right. Those words, the awe in them, suddenly makes this a thousand times hotter than it already was, which doesn’t make sense, because _of course_ he is, that’s what sex is, it should be stupid to say something so obvious, but it’s anything but stupid: the words somehow mean more than Sungyeol ever would have guessed and so does the way Woohyun says them. Fucking hell.

“Yeah,” Sungyeol says, running slightly trembling hands through Woohyun’s damp hair, pushing it away from his face and looking at it again: at that uniquely pointed nose, the lines around Woohyun’s mouth and eyes, his full lips, his eyelashes, everything. “Yeah, you are.”

Woohyun lets out a moan—a really fucking sexy one—at that and Sungyeol’s hands slide from his hair to face, running his fingertips over the landscape of it. Woohyun’s eyes blink open, foggier than before, and he turns his face just enough to brush his lips against Sungyeol’s hand. The gesture is a little cheesy, but Sungyeol doesn’t mind, wouldn’t dream of making fun of him for it, at least not right now, not when there are sweat drops in Woohyun’s eyelashes as he moves inside Sungyeol.

Sungyeol likes this, likes the feel of Woohyun’s skin against his, the smell of him—sweaty, musky—the look on his face. He likes the feeling of Woohyun inside him, too, of the way his own body seems like it’s trying to pull Woohyun back in every time he withdraws. It feels really good, but it doesn’t really feel like it’s building to anything, and now that Sungyeol thinks about it, that makes sense.

So he grips Woohyun’s shoulder with one hand, sneaks the other down between them and after a few fumbling seconds of searching, finds his clit. Yeah, yeah, that’s better: now they’re getting somewhere again. 

But then Woohyun’s hand brushes his aside and when Sungyeol glances up at him, his expression is stubborn.

“I can do that,” Woohyun says, and Sungyeol isn’t sure whether to laugh at him or roll his eyes.

“I know you can. You gave me like a million earlier, but I can—“

“I can do that,” Woohyun repeats, more obstinately this time, and Sungyeol knows a determined Woohyun when he sees one, so he sighs and lets Woohyun take over. And yeah, as good as his own fingers feel, Woohyun’s just feel better: whether it’s because his are bigger and rougher or because he’s spent more time figuring out what Sungyeol likes or even if it’s just a psychological thing of _that’s someone else toching me_ , it doesn’t matter. Sungyeol slides his own hands up to his tits and lets Woohyun stroke him.

And Woohyun’s still really good at it, even when he’s using one straining arm to hold himself up over Sungyeol, even when he’s pumping in and out with sure thrusts of his hips. Sungyeol feels the pleasure building in him again—feels the burning on the bottom of his feet, feels the rippling of sensation from the pit of his abdomen down to where Woohyun is rubbing him, feels the muscles clenching around Woohyun start to pulse. And there’s Woohyun’s face, right above his, watching him with eyes that seem like they want to swallow him completely, even if they’re hazy with pleasure around the edges. 

When Sungyeol comes this time, it’s not as sharp or as intense as it was before, but it builds slowly and spreads surely, and he lets out a long, long gasp at how it seems to rise up inside him and fill him up to his fingertips. He clenches around Woohyun, the fullness increasing, and Woohyun’s fingers fall away as it ebbs back out of him, leaving him tingling and even more tired than before.

But he still manages to lift his lead long enough to brush his lips across Woohyun’s, taking in that intense darkness in Woohyun’s eyes as he does. _What did I do to make you look at me like that?_

“Okay, Woohyun,” he says, and Woohyun starts to move faster, more desperate, and something about it is so endearing to Sungyeol.

Sungyeol had known he’s been trying to hold out till Sungyeol came, and that wasn’t a surprise to Sungyeol at all. Maybe he’d been trying to hold out just for the sake of length, too—some guys do—and though Sungyeol isn’t sure how long they’ve been doing this, he doesn’t really care. Because he had long earlier with Woohyun’s mouth between his legs, and right now he just wants Woohyun to feel as fucking amazing as he does. 

He wraps his legs more tightly around Woohyun’s waist, pulling him in closer; he doesn’t have the energy to get into most of the motion himself, but he wants Woohyun to feel him as close to him as he can be, knows Woohyun wants that even if he won’t ask for anything himself. Woohyun’s hips are moving faster now, barely staying in rhythm, and Sungyeol has the sudden, ridiculous thought that maybe their “Paradise” choreography practice is paying off for Woohyun right now.

But then the humor is gone, because Woohyun is tensing up even more.

“Sungyeol—Sungyeol—“ Woohyun gasps, blindly, desperately, and Sungyeol isn’t sure what he’s asking for, but he knows what to do. He puts his arms around Woohyun’s neck again, squeezes his legs tighter around him, and presses his cheek against Woohyun’s.

“I’m right here, Woohyun. I’m right here.”

The sound Woohyun makes when he comes isn’t like anything Sungyeol has ever heard before, but it’s _amazing_ , and Sungyeol thinks he’ll remember it for the rest of his life. If Woohyun feels half as good as that noise sounds, then this has been as good for Woohyun as Sungyeol wants it to be. And Woohyun is throwing his head back, too, eyes screwing closed, and that has to mean it’s good for him, and the line of his neck is the sexiest thing Sungyeol has ever seen.

When Woohyun finally collapses, he makes sure to do it so that he doesn’t fall flat on Sungyeol, moving his body so he’s mostly on the bed beside him. Sungyeol runs a hand over Woohyun’s sweaty hair, listening to him pant for breath, sighing a bit when Woohyun’s hand reaches out until he finds Sungyeol’s stomach, splaying it out there. If Sungyeol weren’t so tired, he’d laugh at the gesture.

When Woohyun recovers, he lifts his head and looks at Sungyeol, and the awe that Sungyeol sees there makes him feel scared and giddy and humble and uncomfortable all at the same time.

“Does it hurt?” Woohyun asks immediately, and Sungyeol isn’t surprised. “Are you okay?”

“I’m good,” Sungyeol says. “I would have let you know if I wasn’t.”

Woohyun snorts a little laugh, pushes himself up on his arms and then eases his way out of Sungyeol’s body, leaving Sungyeol feeling strange and a bit empty. Woohyun takes off the red-smeared condom, knots it up and throws it in the direction of the trashcan—Sungyeol can hear the sound it makes as it hits the bottom of the tin—and then he flops onto his back beside Sungyeol.

“It’d be weird if I said thank you, wouldn’t it?” Woohyun says after a moment of breathing in sync. 

Sungyeol laughs, breathy and short. “Yeah. It’s not like I made you dinner or bought you a present or something. Besides, I didn’t say thank you to you, and I have more reason to. So yeah: weird.”

“Yeah, but I just want to—“ He stops, starts again. “I just want to say this and—Sungyeol?”

“Yeah?” Sungyeol is too tired to even try to guess what this guy is going to say next.

“I just—you’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.”

Sungyeol considers that for a moment, looking at the pattern of the spackle on the ceiling and listening to Woohyun’s still-a-bit-fast breathing beside him. In a way it’s nice to hear, but…. “I’m not sure how I feel about that.”

“Me, neither,” Woohyun admits. “But Sungyeol?”

“Yeah?”

“You’re also the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen.”

Sungyeol laughs again, a real laugh this time, flopping himself over so that he’s half on top of Woohyun. “God, you’re so greasy.”

Woohyun looks a little bit embarrassed and like he's trying to look defiant instead but not managing it, eyes darting away from Sungyeol’s, and that won’t do at all, so he uses the last bit of energy he has to kiss him, hoping Woohyun will be able to read what that means, because, yeah, saying thank you would be more than a little weird, but the way Woohyun kisses him back, arms coming around him to hold him close and closer, makes Sungyeol suspect that he knows exactly what Sungyeol is trying to say—and that Woohyun is saying it right back.


	8. Chapter 8

The alarm that wakes Woohyun is unfamiliar—not the one in his phone, not Sunggyu’s either—and as he surfaces to consciousness his only bleary thought is, ‘Huh?’ He feels warmer than he usually does when he wakes up, though the air on his cheek is cool and the warmth seems concentrated along one side of him, which doesn’t make much sense, but then he stretches a bit and his feet bump against—and his arm is around—and _skin_ up against his and—

It all slams into him, what happened the night before (the day before—from Sungyeol sneaking out of the dorm with the APink girls to the two of them falling asleep in the same bed, sweaty and sated, and Woohyun thinks that yesterday will always be one of the most important days of his life, right up there with the day he was accepted as a Woollim trainee and the day Infinite debuted) and he almost chokes on the breath he sucks in because that was _real_. He really said—and Sungyeol really said—and he and Sungyeol really— _fuck_.

He tightens his arm around Sungyeol’s waist (because: Sungyeol’s _waist_ , Sungyeol who’s lying bare beside him: they had sex and they slept in the same bed and he told Sungyeol he loved him and Sungyeol is still here and) and the alarm is still going off and Sungyeol lets out a moan and shifts under Woohyun’s arm and his voice is raw and husky when he says, “Can’t you turn that fucking thing _off_ , Woohyun, it’s giving me a headache.”

“It’s your alarm—“ Woohyun starts, and then he stops because—no. _No_. 

He freezes for a moment, trying to figure out if the voice he just heard was the voice he just heard: it could just be rough from sleep, everyone sounds a little more gravelly in the morning, but—

And then he’s flying up to his knees, the sheets billowing off of him and he’s grabbing Sungyeol by the shoulders and flipping him over onto his back and Sungyeol is staring up at him with wide eyes glassy with sleep and confusion and there’s no long hair splayed out across the pillow just a mess of bangs sleep-swept over Sungyeol’s forehead and Woohyun is running his eyes over Sungyeol’s body laying in front of him and his chest is flat except for just the slightest definition of his pecs and his stomach is still the same well of course it is but Woohyun’s heart is jackhammering against the back of his ribs and between Sungyeol’s legs there’s—

“What the fuck are you doing, Woohyun? Is this the way you’re going to wake me up now?”

“Sungyeol,” Woohyun chokes, hands gripping Sungyeol’s—wider—shoulders maybe a bit too hard. “Sungyeol—you’re _back_.”

Sungeyol blinks up at him blankly for a moment, Woohyun’s breathing coming out a little too harsh, and then something explodes like an atom bomb in Sungyeol’s eyes and he’s shooting upright, nearly tripping as the sheets tangle around his ankles as he seeks his balance standing in the middle of the bed, and he’s running his hands over his body—over the flatness of his chest, over the narrowness of his hips, over—oh, come on, does he really need to do _that_ in front of Woohyun? And Woohyun is on his knees staring up at him and the alarm is still going off but neither one of them seem to notice and then Sungyeol lets out this sound that’s halfway between a laugh and a shriek of joy and he leaps off the bed, landing a bit too hard on the ground so that his ankles roll and he only just manages to stay upright, and he’s throwing the door to the bathroom open and staring at himself in the full-length mirror on the back of the door, his laughter sharp with something that mingles disbelief and relief, and again with the running his hands over his body and Woohyun’s heart still hasn’t slowed down at all and he has no idea if it ever will.

“Woohyun!” Sungyeol spins back around to grin at Woohyun with the kind of wild-eyed joy that makes him the only one in Infinite (besides Sungjong) that Hoya’s afraid of. “Hyung, my tits are gone! And my dick—my dick is back!” He looks down then, grabbing his dick in his hand and giving it a happy squeeze, body bowed over strangely as though he’s trying to get his face as close to it as he can. “Fuck, I missed _you_ ,” he says, and it takes Woohyun a second to realize that Sungyeol is _addressing his dick_. “I wish I could kiss my own dick, wouldn’t that be awesome, Woohyun, if I could just kiss it because I’m so happy to see it?”

Woohyun’s mouth works in silence; he isn’t sure at all of what to say to that. _Um, no, that would be really weird?_ But Sungyeol doesn’t seem to need an answer; instead he just releases himself (thank _God_ ), shaking his body in a weird dance of joy that looks absolutely _ridiculous_. Sungyeol has always looked funny when he dances one of his stupid dances, throwing his long limbs around like he’s the lovechild of a gazelle and a bowl of noodles, but it’s so much stranger looking when he’s naked and his dick is flopping around too and Woohyun should really probably look away now. 

Sungyeol lets out another shriek of happiness, then bounces back over to the bed, landing on the mattress on his knees face-to-face with Woohyun and almost making Woohyun lose his balance and fall over.

But Sungyeol’s hands—his _own_ hands—are on Woohyun’s shoulders now, holding him up and Sungyeol leans in close. “ _Woohyun_ ,” he says, his voice quieter than before but just as intense, like he’s confiding something, his eyes still shining, and fuck he’s so gorgeous, he was always gorgeous, but right now he’s more gorgeous than ever. “I’m _back_.”

Woohyun has been watching all this in a sort of daze, muscles tense with shock, but when Sungyeol says that, his own excitement geysers up through him and he gasps a laugh (even if a very, very tiny part of him, a part that he tries his best to ignore, cringes and wonders, _And will you regret everything now that you’re back to yourself again?_ But Woohyun hates that selfish part of himself, so he focuses on the giddiness). “Yeah. Yeah, Yeol, you are.”

The kiss comes out of nowhere and surprises Woohyun almost as much as seeing Sungyeol back in his own body. It’s fierce, but it doesn’t last very long, not long enough for Woohyun to recover from his own shock, because Sungyeol is pulling back, feet back on the floor and running his hands over his body again. 

“I’m _back_ ,” he announces again, totally not noticing how gobsmacked Woohyun is by the kiss (and relief, too, is beginning to tamp down on that selfish part of him). “I’m back just the same—my chest is back just the same and my hair and my face and my dick—well, you wouldn’t really know about that so much unless you’ve been sneaking looks in the bathroom, which you probably have, you perv—but hey—“ He reaches out and grabs Woohyun’s hand, bringing it to his stomach and making it splay out against the skin. “My stomach is still the same, too, I’m sure you’re very happy to know. I wouldn’t want you to have to cry over it being different and you being parted from your favorite part of me. And this, too—“ And then Woohyun is almost choking again because Sungyeol is leading his hand around to his ass and Woohyun makes a strangled noise as Sungyeol’s hand molds itself over his to make him squeeze. “Just the same, right, Woohyun?”

“I—what?”

“Well, you’re the expert on that—it’s not like I check out my own ass very often. If there’s any differences, I’m not going to know till you tell me, so you better make sure. Though I don’t know what we’ll do if there _is_ any differences.”

Like—like Woohyun is going to stand here and grope Sungyeol’s ass at Sungyeol’s invitation and—okay, yeah, he’d squeezed it last night, and he’s fantasized about it plenty, but this is _different_ , this isn’t sexy (except in the way that anything involving Sungyeol and his naked ass is sexy) and is Sungyeol teasing him or is he sincere?—it’s so hard to tell sometimes.

But he doesn’t have to figure it out anyway because the alarm, which had paused a few minutes before—just when, both of them were too distracted to notice—starts its insistence blaring again. “What the fuck, why don’t you turn that off, Woohyun?” Sungyeol demands, hand falling away from Woohyun’s (Woohyun lets go of Sungyeol’s ass hastily), and once again Woohyun is amazed at just how Sungyeol Sungyeol is.

“It’s your phone, dumbass,” Woohyun recovers himself enough to point out. 

“Oh, yeah,” Sungyeol says, grinning, and then he’s moving away (still unselfconsciously naked) and picking up the phone off the bedside table and thumbing it off, cutting off the annoying noise and leaving Woohyun’s ears ringing just a bit in the silence that follows (at least, the ringing is probably from the alarm. Probably). 

But Sungyeol is still grinning at him, gummy and wide, and honestly it looks almost exactly the same as it had when Sungyeol was in a girl’s body. Sungyeol is always _Sungyeol_. 

“I get to go to schedules today!” Sungyeol exclaims, clapping his hands, and Woohyun is pretty sure he’s never seen him this happy over idol obligations.

Woohyun thinks maybe he should be jumping around the room or dancing or something because he’s _so glad_ that Sungyeol is back to himself, but he’s still a bit too dazed for that. He resorts to banter instead, reaching out for it as though for support. “Missed it, did you? I wonder how long that will last. You know you used to complain about schedules more than anyone, but Sunggyu’s not going to let you get away with that now, not once I tell him how much you missed them.” (Sungyeol is still naked. And so is Woohyun. But Woohyun is trying not to think about that.)

“If you tell him, I’ll tell him that you were planning on putting a wig and makeup on him while he was asleep and putting all the pictures up on the fancafe,” Sungyeol shoots back, sitting himself down on the edge of the bed beside Woohyun.

Woohyun punches him in the shoulder (and it’s so…freeing to be able to do that again, without worrying whether it would hurt him). “That was your idea, jackass!”

“Yeah, but _hyung_ doesn’t know that,” Sungyeol points out cheekily.

“You are unbelievable,” Woohyun answers, shaking his head, and that’s hardly the first time he’s said that to Sungyeol, but really: everything about Sungyeol is unbelievable. It’s simultaneously the craziest and the most natural thing in the world that Woohyun loves him.

“Yeah, unbelievably _a guy again_. A guy who can go out in public and actually have a life!”

Woohyun hates to have to say this, but…. “You’re still an idol, Yeol. It’s not like you can do what we did yesterday. You still have rules to follow.”

“Yeah, but I’ll be following them _in my own body_. Come on, let’s get ready to go!” Sungyeol says, bouncing to his feet again.

“Uh, we really don’t have to go so early, Yeol,” Woohyun says, pointing to the clock sitting on the bedside table and blinking the numbers that remind him that it’s obscenely early in the morning—even for idols. 

“Oh, yeah,” Sungyeol says, no doubt remembering that they’d set it so early because Woohyun had wanted to be able to help Sungyeol take care of himself before he had to leave for schedules. And then Sungyeol laughs, throwing his head back.

Woohyun wants to be let in on the joke. “What’s so funny?” 

“You were _so concerned_ last night,” Sungyeol gasps between panted breaths. “You were so upset that I was going to be all in pain this morning and I told you we didn’t need to wake up this early, but you _insisted_ you wanted to have all the time you needed to look after me and—“

Woohyun punches Sungyeol in the shoulder again, glaring at the way Sungyeol is teasing him for his behavior as they fought over when to set the alarm last night. “I was _worried_ about you, you ass. Excuse me for feeling bad that you were going to be in pain because of me.”

“Yeah, except I’m not in pain! I’m not in pain at all! Because I don’t have a vagina anymore, so there’s nothing to hurt!” Sungyeol yells, pumping his fist in the air. “I got multiple orgasms my _very first time_ in that body, _and_ I’m pain free the next day! Take that, universe! You may enjoy jerking me around for your own amusement, but _I_ got the best of _both_ worlds!” And then he does one of his stupid little dances again and Woohyun has to smile to see him except—

Mid-crazy dance move, Sungyeol notices the soberness that’s fallen over Woohyun’s face and pauses in his jig. “What? What are you making that face for? You look constipated.”

“Nothing—it’s nothing,” Woohyun hurries to assure him, because it’s a stupid thought anyway, and it’s definitely the last thing Sungyeol needs at this moment, another worry as stupid as this one.

Sungyeol glares. “Tell me.”

“I said it was nothing.”

“Tell me, Nam Woohyun! Or I’ll tell Gyu-hyung you moaned his name when we were getting it on last night!”

Woohyun stares at him, aghast. “I did not.”

“No,” Sungyeol agrees with a grin. “But who’s he going to believe?”

“Me, obviously.” Seriously, Sungyeol? “I’m way more responsible than you—he knows you lie about stuff like that.” 

“Yeah, but he knows you lie, too, so it’ll niggle in his head—always the off-chance that maybe you really _did_ , that maybe I wasn’t lying, and things will become weird between you two and he won’t ever be able to look at you quite the same way again no matter how hard he tries and—“

 _Why_ is Woohyun in love with this lunatic again? “Okay, fine! I’ll tell you!”

Sungyeol clasps his hands together like he’s waiting, which would be okay—even cute—except for the fact that he’s _still_ naked (they’re both still naked) so it just looks…perverse. Woohyun takes a deep breath.

“I just thought….”

“Out with it, Nam!” Sungyeol barks in a scarily good impression of Sunggyu when he’s in leader mode.

Woohyun glares at him, then looks away. “I just…we don’t know what made this happen and we don’t know what made you change back—“

“Maybe you screwed me right back into my real body,” Sungyeol interrupts.

And again: _why_ is Woohyun in love with this lunatic? “Lee Sungyeol, what the _fuck_?”

Sungyeol just laughs at the redness rising on Woohyun’s neck. “I just meant like a fairy tale, you know? The frog gets kissed, it turns back into a prince. I get fucked, I turn back into myself…”

“That’s a really dirty fairy tale, and you’re no prince, Lee Sungyeol,” Woohyun says, still not happy with the teasing.

“I’m the prince of _everything_ ,” Sungyeol insists smugly, and Woohyun can’t even respond to that for fear he’ll end up agreeing, so he changes the subject back to the previous one.

“Since we don’t know what made it happen or what made it end, how do we know that….” He trails off, not able to bring himself to say it.

But he doesn’t need to; Sungyeol has a quick mind and it wouldn’t surprise Woohyun if the thought had been there lurking in the back of Sungyeol’s brilliant brain all along, just overshadowed by his joy. Sungyeol’s lips tighten. “….that it won’t happen again,” Sungyeol finishes for him. “ _Fuck_ , Woohyun, why did you have to make me think of that? I was doing a good job ignoring it.”

He kicks the foot of the bed lightly, looking away at the thick curtains that cover the window, and it should probably be funny, seeing him look that dejected when he’s not wearing any clothes, but it really, really isn’t.

Woohyun stares down at his own hands, picking at one of the nails and noting distractedly that they should probably be cut today. It’s very quiet, but after a moment Sungyeol grins. “Hey, at least I still know you’re into me when I’m a girl, too. That’s convenient.”

“That’s not funny, Yeol.” _Like that makes it okay._

Sungyeol just shrugs. “Seriously, though, I’m not going to worry about it, and you shouldn’t either,” Sungyeol announces and Woohyun eyes him warily.

“Okay….”

“For a couple of reasons.” Sungyeol walks back over and flops down on the bed on his stomach, resting on his elbows. Woohyun moves to lie beside him in the same position, a bit relieved that this way they can’t see each others’ bodies.

“One,” Sungyeol says, holding up a finger. “Since it’s completely out of our control, worrying doesn’t do any good.”

Woohyun rolls his eyes; he’d been expecting more. “I know _that_. But since when has worry been a rational thing?”

“Never,” Sungyeol allows. “But it’s not just not-worrying—it’s _actively_ not worrying. Because if we do, it’ll ruin our lives because we’ll have to worry every single day. It’s one thing to worry when, like, an asteroid gets too close to the planet because it _could_ slam into us and put an end to humanity just like it did the dinosaurs. But once the asteroid moves beyond us, you can stop worrying, right? You still have no control over whether the asteroid slams into us, but it won’t ruin your life worrying about it because you only have to worry when there’s a reason to worry—like when one is actually near us.”

“I think you’ve been watching too many American disaster movies.”

“Whatever. What I’m saying is, when there’s no…signs that you should be worrying, then you have to worry all the time. When there are no rules, no pattern to what’s going on, then every moment of every day is terrifying.”

“That makes sense, but it’s pretty obvious, Yeol.”

“Yeah, but here’s number two.” Another finger. “There’s no scientific reason for what happened to me—or at least none that we could possibly know about. But we’ve never heard of it happening to anyone before, so it’s got to be really, really rare. If that’s the case, what’s the likelihood of it happening _again_?”

Yeah, but…. “But some people have been struck by lightning multiple times, Yeol,” Woohyun points out.

That doesn’t faze Sungyeol at all. “Yeah, but the odds of that happening are way, way less than of this happening. It happening once was one in six billion or something, but twice? There’s no way.”

Woohyun isn’t all that impressed. “That sounds like you’re tempting fate.”

“No,” Sungyeol insists impatiently. “It’s playing the numbers. Why do you think I get mad at Dongwoo-hyung when he buys lottery tickets?”

“Because he’s an idol who’s making more than enough money to support his family?”

Sungyeol rolls his eyes. “ _Because_ the odds are ridiculous. A raffle ticket might be worth the risk. The lottery almost never is. Yeah, there’s that off-chance, but it’s not worth betting against those numbers. It’s stupid, just like it would be for us to worry about this happening again when the odds are so infinitely against it.”

Woohyun finds he’s gnawing on his lip, makes himself stop. “Worrying doesn’t have much to do with logic, though,” he reminds Sungyeol. “It’s…primal. Or something. People who are scared of planes may know intellectually that there’s a way bigger chance of them dying in a car accident than of anything happening in the plane, but that doesn’t keep them from being scared. And those people can just avoid planes if they want, but—but there’s nothing for us to avoid here—if it happens, we won’t know it’s coming, we’ll never know what triggered it, we won’t—”

Sungyeol cuts him off by nudging him—hard—with his shoulder. “Woohyun. I know all that. You just have to keep telling yourself that there’s no use worrying until it sinks in. You’ll be all jumpy or whatever the first few months but eventually you’ll get over it and get back to regular life again when nothing else happens. And maybe it’ll lurk in the back of your mind, but not enough to affect your life.”

“I know, but—wait, _I_ ’ll be all jumpy? What about _you_?” Woohyun demands.

The grin Sungyeol gives him is half smirk. “I’m not going to worry at all. But I know you, you’re freaking out about it. So yeah: _you_ ’ll be all jumpy.”

Woohyun snorts, looking away, annoyed by how true he knows that to be. Sungyeol isn’t the type to let himself worry over something that’s beyond his control. Woohyun, unfortunately, is. 

“Stop brooding,” Sungyeol commands, reaching around to flick Woohyun in the forehead again.

“Ow! Stop _doing_ that—I’ll do it back to you now!” Woohyun says, reaching out to do it, but Sungyeol’s hands shoot out and close around his wrists, pulling his arms away.

“Oh, so you weren’t doing it before because I was a girl?” Sungyeol mocks as he struggles to keep his grip on Woohyun’s wrists. “I thought you were all about treating me like _me_. But you were holding back and—what did I say about coddling?”

Somehow the struggle has turned into a wrestling match, the two of them grappling all over the bed, and fuck, it’s so different now than it was last night, now that Woohyun can let loose his full strength and know he isn’t going to snap Sungyeol in half (or, more realistically, bruise him)—Sungyeol’s still not quite a match for him strength-wise, but the difference is enough that he doesn’t have to worry too much. “You said you love it when I make you your favorite meals and help you sneak out of the dorm so we can play and then give you a million orgasms.”

Sungyeol pauses in the middle of their tussle and cocks his head to the side, considering (which makes Woohyun pause, so he can look at him), and even with his hair a mess like that—maybe _especially_ with his hair a mess like that—face still a bit flush with excitement and eyes shining, he’s this almost unbearably appealing mixture of adorable and sexy that makes Woohyun fall in love all over again. His heart only clenches up even more when a big grin breaks across Sungyeol’s face and he nods, “Yeah, okay: coddle away.”

Jackass. Woohyun again tries to wrench his wrists out of Sungyeol’s grasp and the struggle starts up again. “Who says I want to anymore? Maybe I don’t want to now that I know what a hypocrite you are, telling me not to coddle you one minute and then asking for it the next?”

“Whatever, Nam, all you want to do is coddle me for the rest of my life,” Sungyeol shoots back, and his voice is light, but the truth of those words pierces through Woohyun, almost too sharp to handle, so he throws himself back on the bed, giving Sungyeol a good yank, and then Sungyeol is sprawled out on top of him and they’re both still naked and Sungyeol’s face is _right there_ and—

“We should probably put some clothes on now,” Woohyun’s voice cracks around the heart that’s beating in his mouth.

Sungyeol gives him a skeptical look. “Well, that would be pretty stupid since we’d only have to take them right off again.”

Woohyun winces. “Sungyeol—“

“Oh, no, no, no, no, no.” Sungyeol’s voice snaps emphatically as he sits upright and now he’s casually straddling Woohyun who’s still lying down but there’s no such thing as _casually_ straddling someone, Woohyun is convinced, and— “You are not going to make me go through all this again, are you? The convincing you that I know what I want? Because once was bad enough, but if this is going to be a regular thing every time we fool around, then I’m going to get really pissed.”

Woohyun doesn’t even have to ask the question; he’s sure it’s written all over his face.

Sungyeol sighs, though his exasperation sounds mixed with affection (or at least that’s what Woohyun tells himself). “Yes, Nam Woohyun, ‘every time.’ Remember the me-choosing-you thing? You didn’t really think I’d wake up back in my own body and go—“ He slaps himself on the forehead, letting his eyes roll back dramatically as he groans, “‘I’ve made a terrible mistake!’” His expression snaps back to unimpressed, eyes sharp on Woohyun’s face. “Did you?” 

Woohyun tries to keep his face impassive, but apparently he doesn’t do a very good job, because Sungyeol groans again, just as dramatic but clearly real this time. “Seriously, Woohyun? What kind of a flake do you think I am? Was it because of the estrogen or do you think I’m like this all the time?”

“Yeol—“

“Do you think I’m so completely self-involved that I don’t even care about jerking you around like a bastard or do you think I’m enough of a jerk to do it on purpose?”

“Yeol—“

“I _meant_ what I said, and I’m not going to change my mind, especially not just because I’ve changed _bodies_ —did you miss the part where we spent the whole day yesterday convincing each other that I’m still me no matter what body I’m in?”

“Yeol—“

“I made a decision and I meant it. You! Me! Together! Get it through your thick head!”

“Okay!” Woohyun finally manages to shout, grabbing the fist that’s punching into his shoulder. “Yeol, okay, I get it, I swear!” Sungyeol gives him another skeptical look, and Woohyun releases Sungyeol’s fist, holding up his own hands. “You, me, together. I get it.” 

For another moment, Sungyeol doesn’t look very convinced, and Woohyun can’t really blame him when he can barely believe the words himself ( _everything I’ve been wanting for so long and thought I would never, ever get and it’s **real**?_ ), but then he grins again, leaning down to give Woohyun a particularly filthy kiss.

Woohyun is panting when Sungyeol pulls back, and okay: he’d been able to keep his response to Sungyeol’s body under control earlier, assisted by the initial shock of the transformation and then the serious conversation that followed, but ever since Sungyeol’s been straddling him like Woohyun is the most comfortable chair he owns, he’s been half-hard and he’s wanted Sungyeol like this _forever_ , but—

“Are you sure we should—“ At Sungyeol’s dangerously narrowed eyes, Woohyun reroutes. “I just mean right now! When you’re just back in your body again and—“

“Um, yes,” Sungyeol says, looking at him like he’s an idiot and drawing the words out like Woohyun won’t understand them otherwise. “I’m _back in my own body_. Did it seriously never occur to you that the very first thing I’d want to do is try out the equipment and make sure everything’s working properly?”

That phrasing should really be the opposite of hot, but somehow it’s one of the sexiest things Woohyun has ever heard and oh yeah: Sungyeol is still _straddling_ him and Woohyun is more than willing to let himself be convinced.

“Besides,” Sungyeol says, and the smile that spreads across his face is hot and dangerous and he’s leaning back down towards Woohyun’s face again. “We know now we work really well together when I’m a girl and you’re a guy. Don’t you want to see how it goes when we’re both guys?”

At the invitation, Woohyun surges up against him, arm wrapping around his waist to yank him closer, and Sungyeol’s lips move just as eagerly under his as Woohyun’s own. And now that they’re kissing, really kissing, Woohyun can tell that he was right the night before: it doesn’t matter which body Sungyeol is in, kissing him is the same: better than any other kiss Woohyun can imagine. “How much you want to bet,” Sungyeol breathes when they come up for air, his breath fanning against Woohyun’s lips. “It’s just as good as before?” Woohyun lunges forward for another kiss, but Sungyeol jerks back suddenly, brow wrinkling. “Well, there won’t be multiple orgasms, so I guess it won’t be _quite_ —“

But Woohyun is fully won over at this point, doesn’t need any more convincing. “Sungyeol?”

“Yeah?”

“Shut up.”

 

 

Despite the shortness of Woohyun’s words, he doesn’t put up a bit of resistance when Sungyeol pushes him down onto the bed, Sungyeol moving to drape himself half across him. One of Woohyun’s hands slides up into Sungyeol’s hair and Sungyeol’s figured out his signals by this time: he wants a kiss, so Sungyeol gives him one, one that turns into more and more, longer and longer, and as their lips and tongues explore each other, Sungyeol realizes that this isn’t really any different than it was last night. He’s back in his own body, he’s male again, maybe it should be different, but the kissing is the same: Woohyun’s flavor, the way their mouths fit together, the way it makes Sungyeol’s heart rate pick up: all the same as it was the night before. It’s somehow such a…relief to realize that that something relaxes in Sungyeol that he hadn’t realized was tense with anxiety, and he kisses Woohyun with all the fervor he can muster (which is considerable: Lee Sungyeol always has lots of energy and he slept _well_ last night). 

“You taste the same,” Woohyun pants when they finally part, and now Sungyeol notes that he likes the way the pupils swallow Woohyun’s irises just as much as now as he did when he was in the girl’s body. “Just the same.”

“Told you. And I told you it had nothing to do with me being a girl—I just like this,” Sungyeol replies, and if anything Woohyun’s eyes go even darker as he lifts his face for another kiss.

When they’re kissing like this, making out, mouths parting briefly to survey necks and earlobes and collarbones, it really doesn’t feel any different than it did last night, at least not until Woohyun’s hands start sliding over Sungyeol’s body—and it’s about time, Sungyeol had honestly thought he was going to have to _make_ Woohyun touch him again. Sungyeol really hopes Woohyun is going to get over this hesitance to get physical—at first he’d assumed that it was just because Sungyeol wasn’t in his real body, but now he’s back and Woohyun still seems too tentative. Not that Sungyeol minds initiating, because he doesn’t, but he has this niggling feeling that Woohyun still doesn’t believe any of this is real, still suspects he’s going to wake up and find he dreamed the whole thing up. And that won’t do at all.

“Notice any changes?” Sungyeol gasps as Woohyun’s mouth slides along his collarbones and Woohyun’s hands slide up his back. “It could be like in _Harry Potter_ where you can end up leaving an eyebrow or part of your arm behind.”

Sungyeol’s half-braced for Woohyun to make fun of him for reference _Harry Potter_ while they’re fooling around, but Woohyun doesn’t seem to even have heard him. “Your back is really fucking sexy,” Woohyun mumbles against Sungyeol’s neck, his hands splayed out over Sungyeol’s shoulder blades, and the rumble of his voice makes Sungyeol’s blood speed up.

“So it’s my back now?” he asks, scratching his nails across Woohyun’s scalp. What part of him will Woohyun become infatuated with next?

“You’ve got muscle there now,” Woohyun clarifies, still palming Sungyeol’s shoulder blades, running a tongue over Sungyeol’s beauty marks. The hot dampness makes Sungyeol squirm. “When we first met you were all skin and bones—except for your cheeks—but now your back is really hot.”

Sungyeol remembers when he was just lanky, when he thought he’d look like an awkward teenage boy forever, when he’d hated to look at Hoya’s body because it looked like a man’s when Sungyeol’s didn’t. He knows he’s never going to have the abs and the impressive musculature some of the other guys have—he’s just not built that way—but he has worked hard, and he does think he’s finally to the point where he’s stopped looking like a gangly teenager. Woohyun seems to appreciate it, at any rate, which is a bit of a relief; Woohyun had done a really good job last night of convincing him that it was _Sungyeol_ he wanted to be with, regardless of his body, but it’s nice to have the confirmation now: Woohyun seems just as enamored of this body as he was the female one if the hardness beginning to nudge against Sungyeol’s hip is anything to go by. _He just wants me. My body doesn’t matter to him except for the fact that it’s mine._

But it matters to Sungyeol. The hazy sense of _wrongness_ that’s been hovering in the back of his mind like something just beyond peripheral vision is gone now, and whenever he glances down at his hands or his chest—or between his legs—he doesn’t have that sickening jolt of realization that’s been yanking his stomach around for the past few days. He’d been able to wrestle with Woohyun for real earlier, and even when he was standing on the bed or jumping to the floor, he hasn’t gotten the sudden vertigo that comes from his balance not being quite what he’d expected it to be. He’d kind of wanted to stare at himself forever in the mirror: everything back the way it’s supposed to be, every inch of himself familiar but at the same time with a sheen of newness that makes him think, ‘Huh. Has my mouth always been shaped like that? Have my legs always looked just that way?’ He thinks maybe he’ll never tire of looking at himself now, that maybe he’ll become as fascinated by the mirror as Myunsoo is. He’s _himself_ , with every bit of him back to the way it’s supposed to be.

And his dick is back, too, which is maybe the most important thing. Multiple orgasms aside (if you can possibly put them aside), he’d really missed it.

He isn’t sure at this moment whether the shimmery feeling he’s got—the abundance of energy surging up inside him that makes him want to shriek with happiness and jump around and shout (and, you know, get it on with Woohyun)—is from what Woohyun is doing to him or just because of how giddy with joy he is to be back in his own body. When Woohyun had manhandled him onto his back as he woke him up, intense eyes raking over his body, it had taken a second or two for it to all sink in. And then—and then when he felt himself, when he looked at himself and realized he was _back to himself again_ , the tsunami of emotions—relief, joy, gratitude, disbelief, hope—that had crashed into him had been more intense than just about any feeling he’s felt in his life (he hadn’t realized until just that moment how terrified he was that he would be stuck like that forever). He’d felt like the force of them was going to squeeze him right out of his body like a toothpaste out of a tube, but then there’d been Woohyun, and somehow him just being in the room had been enough to keep Sungyeol grounded. 

And just at this moment he feels like the only thing holding him together is Woohyun—Woohyun’s chest pressed against his (yeah, it feels different without Sungyeol’s tits between them, and he isn’t as sensitive there as he was before, but it’s still really nice), Woohyun’s mouth on Sungyeol’s neck, Woohyun’s hands grasping Sungyeol’s shoulders as though refamiliarizing himself with them through touch. 

Which gives Sungyeol a thought. Grabbing Woohyun’s head, he pries Woohyun’s mouth away from his neck—and Woohyun actually fucking _pouts_ , and his lips are swollen even larger than they usually are, and _fuck_ , that should be annoying, not attractive—so he can catch Woohyun’s eyes.

“You can do it, you know.”

Woohyun blinks at him, and Sungyeol’s pretty sure that at least half the confusion on his face is from being asked to actually engage in conversation at a moment like this, but the other half is probably from genuinely having no idea what Sungyeol is talking about.

“Touch my stomach. And my legs. And my ass.”

Woohyun flushes a bit at that—and it’s almost too adorable, which is kind of weird because Sungyeol is not at all used to thinking of Nam Woohyun as adorable, but the weirdest thing of all is that he kind of is. “Yeol—“

“I know you want to,” Sungyeol says in a teasing voice, and Woohyun rolls his eyes, ears still tinged with pink.

“You are such an ass.”

“An ass with an ass,” Sungyeol confirms. “An ass you really like. That I am giving you permission to touch—but don’t get carried away, we’re not doing _that_ today. We only had the one condom and I’m willing to bet you don’t carry lube around with you.”

Woohyun rolls his eyes again, but before he can get smart back, Sungyeol kisses him hard. And then he feels Woohyun’s hand cupping his ass, squeezing, and the other gets a good grip on one of his thighs, and Woohyun moans into the kiss, but Sungyeol isn’t sure whether it’s from the kissing or from getting to touch Sungyeol, but he really doesn’t care. He just likes it when Woohyun moans like that.

Sungyeol, meanwhile, is running his hands over Woohyun’s chest and shoulders and back, and so what if he felt them all last night? It’s not exactly something he’d get tired of: taut, smooth skin over shifting muscle. Now that Sungyeol’s back to his real size, Woohyun seems smaller; not fragile, but just not bulky. And he’s shorter than Sungyeol, so there’s stretching or bending that has to be done to bring their lips together when they’re both upright, but Sungyeol doesn’t mind. He kind of likes it.

Likes, too, the feel of Woohyun’s just-a-bit-rough hand sliding up and down his thigh, the other squeezing his rear. But the way he’s laying, half-sprawled on top of Woohyun, he knows Woohyun doesn’t have much access to his stomach—and knowing Woohyun, he wants said access—so he presses one last kiss to Woohyun’s lips and then flips over onto his back.

Now that they’re not touching, Woohyun rolls onto his side and looks at Sungyeol a bit uncertainly, and Sungyeol sighs and grabs his hand and leads it to his stomach, letting it starfish on the softness just below his navel. His touch is tentative at first, but gains in firmness, and it isn’t like this is one of Sungyeol’s erogenous zones or anything, but somehow the way Woohyun touches him there is really hot in a way that’s got nothing to do with nerve endings. “Is it the same, Woohyun?” he asks, and he didn’t plan for his voice to come out that husky, but the way Woohyun sucks his breath in means Sungyeol certainly isn’t going to complain.

“It’s the same,” Woohyun says, eyes smoky. “This is still you, here.” And then he leans down slowly and presses a kiss just beside Sungyeol’s bellybutton, nuzzling a bit with his nose and resting his cheek just briefly. And it’s weird, because it’s more sweet than Sungyeol ever would have thought he’d like a gesture, but somehow, with Woohyun, he can’t bring himself to mind.

“Woohyun….”

But as Woohyun straightens, his eyes glance between Sungyeol’s legs, and Sungyeol’s only half-hard at this point (Woohyun’s harder than him, Sungyeol has noticed, but he’s been trying not to pay attention to that because it’s still weird to him, Woohyun getting aroused by him, even if he likes it), but the back of Woohyun’s neck is red now.

Sungyeol clears his throat. “Are you gonna—?”

“Yeah,” Woohyun answers, eyes still on Sungyeol’s dick, and maybe Sungyeol twitches a little.

“Do you even know what to do with it?” he can’t help but joke, but the question is real, too, because he has no idea what Woohyun has or hasn’t done before.

Woohyun’s eyes flicker to his and his ears are still red, but he answers readily enough. “Not really, you’re the first guy I’ve ever—“ He stops at that, and when he starts again, he’s got a bit of a smile on his face. “What’s that you said that once? Whatever I have, you have it, too? I’m sure I can figure it out.”

And he figures it out pretty fast, hand closing firm around Sungyeol, stroking him towards hardness as Sungyeol groans and bucks up into his grip. Sungyeol had forgotten how good it felt, having someone else touch him—it’s been so long. Woohyun, as usual, gains more confidence once he can tell that Sungyeol likes it, pumping him harder and reaching down to cup him now and then and it isn’t long before Sungyeol’s fully hard.

He whines when Woohyun lets him go, but then Woohyun is stretching out above him to kiss him and he _does_ really like kissing Woohyun, and when Woohyun shifts closer, the warmth of his dick brushes against Sungyeol’s, sending a shock right through him, and Sungyeol kind of wants to look down and see them next to each other like that because he’s pretty sure there’s something hot about that sight that he’d never considered before, but Woohyun is still kissing him and then when he pulls back, he immediately starts sliding back down Sungyeol’s body.

Sungyeol really shouldn’t be surprised by absolutely anything Woohyun does at this point, not after all the shocks last night, but his jaw drops—and not just to let out a gasp—when Woohyun presses a kiss to the tip of Sungyeol’s dick. 

“What the fuck was that?” Sungyeol yelps as his dick bobs in response.

Sungyeol is surprised Woohyun’s face can stay as red as it is when so much of his blood is otherwise occupied, but somehow it manages. “You said you wanted to kiss it, but you can’t, and so—“

Sungyeol just stares at him for a moment, and then he throws his head back and laughs and laughs and laughs—this _guy_! _Seriously!_ —and it doesn’t even matter that Woohyun is still leaning over his dick and that it’s bobbing around while Sungyeol laughs and that Woohyun is practically going purple now, because this is too funny and how is Woohyun even _real_? 

Woohyun punches Sungyeol in the thigh. “Shut up, you asshole.”

But Sungyeol just keeps laughing, hands flopping around helplessly, and Woohyun is so _Woohyun_ and how does he even exist? Oh, God, he’s _fantastic_.

“I said shut up!” Another punch, but this one doesn’t do any more to stop Sungyeol’s laughter than the first one. Sungyeol thinks maybe he’ll keep laughing forever, maybe he’ll never stop because Woohyun is Woohyun and Sungyeol is back in his own body and now he’s somehow got a boyfriend who says and does the most ridiculous things—where does he come up with this stuff?—and he gets his life back and—

And Woohyun is clearly tired of being laughed at, because he abruptly takes Sungyeol in his mouth, and Sungyeol’s laughter tangles up in his throat till he’s half-gasping half-choking, fingers scrabbling against the bed sheets for something to latch onto, and Sungyeol’s suspicion from yesterday that Woohyun has the greatest mouth in the world is once again confirmed (if he needed any confirmation after the multiple orgasms yesterday).

For someone who said he doesn’t have any previous experience with this sort of thing, Woohyun does really, really well. And maybe it’s because Woohyun is throwing himself into it the way he did the night before—the way, Sungyeol is beginning to suspect, he will into anything he thinks will make Sungyeol happy (right now? Sungyeol is _really_ happy). Enthusiasm probably counts for a lot, and Woohyun is nothing if not enthusiastic. Besides, he’s always been good with his mouth—singing, snarking, kissing, why should this be any different?

At some point Woohyun has moved to straddle Sungyeol’s legs, and his hands are moving up and down Sungyeol’s legs in a movement that in other circumstances might be soothing but that right now is driving Sungyeol even crazier. Those hands are strong, strong enough to hold Sungyeol down when he starts squirming too much, starts thrusting up into Woohyun’s mouth just a little too hard, and they’re also just the right kind of rough when they sometimes reach up to assist Woohyun’s mouth. Sungyeol knows he’s moaning and whimpering, but he barely even hears himself, all of his attention zeroed in on the pleasure Woohyun’s mouth is giving him. 

The warning signs—the ones he recognizes from previous experience in this body, from all the times he’s jerked himself off in bed or in the shower or wherever—seem sharper than they did before, and he doesn’t know if it’s because he’s not quite used to being back in this body or if it’s just because it’s been a while since he’s gotten off when he’s himself or if something subtle about him has changed after the transformation experience or if Woohyun is just really good at this, but he doesn’t really care, because he can tell by the way every bit of him is starting to tingle with heat that this is going to be _really good_.

Sungyeol gropes down until he gets a handful of Woohyun’s hair and then he yanks it in warning. “Woohyun—Woohyun, you should—I’m about to— _Woohyun_.”

But Woohyun just grips his thighs harder and redoubles his efforts and his mouth feels _so fucking amazing_ that Sungyeol can’t bring himself to force him to pull back. 

So when he comes, moaning and whining, back bowing off the bed, it’s in Woohyun’s fucking fantastic mouth, and it feels so different than it did last night, the heat moving in different ways throughout his body, the throbbing and release completely unlike the clenching and contracting of muscles in the other body, and yet the pleasure is somehow the same, filling Sungyeol up with warmth and flowing in and out of him like a tide. 

And when he collapses back onto the bed like he did the night before, Woohyun lets him go and crawls back up his body, and Sungyeol raises his mouth for a kiss, and the taste of his own release is completely different, but underneath it the flavor of Woohyun is the same, and so are his arms pulling Sungyeol close to him and so is the way Sungyeol lets him hold him in ways he’d never thought he’d want to be held.

Sungyeol is almost fully recovered when Woohyun runs a hand over Sungyeol’s hair. “Well,” he says, lips twitching (and Sungyeol thinks he’ll never need any other image to get himself off for the rest of his life but the one of Woohyun’s swollen lips around his dick). “I guess everything’s back in reasonable working order, yeah?”

Sungyeol is too lazy to lift one of his hands to smack Woohyun, so he just rolls his eyes and bites down—not very hard—on Woohyun’s nearest shoulder. 

“Ow!” Woohyun says, pushing Sungyeol’s head away and rubbing at the (faint) bite marks. “What was that for?”

“You were getting too proud of yourself again.”

“Why shouldn’t I be proud of myself,” Woohyun shoots back. “I can get you off as a girl _and_ as a guy.”

Sungyeol thinks about that for a moment. “Okay, good point.” He can give credit where it’s due. “What about you?”

“I told you I can take care of myself,” Woohyun replies, and Sungyeol has to scoff at that.

“What kind of boyfriend do you think I _am_? You getting me off and me not returning the favor? Seriously?” 

It’s more than clear to Sungyeol that Woohyun is hung up on that word—‘boyfriend’—and that he’s just barely keeping himself from saying something about it (probably with his eyes going all soft and hopeful like they did when he got caught up in the word ‘yet’), but Sungyeol wants to make it clear that he’s serious about this if it’s the last thing he does (and it might be: Woohyun is not very easy to convince, apparently), and he thinks the best way to do that is just to be matter-of-fact about it. So before Woohyun can go all melty over Sungyeol calling himself his boyfriend, Sungyeol says, “So you don’t think I can do it?”

For a second, Woohyun looks a bit panicked like he’s offended Sungyeol somehow, and then he understands, rising to meet Sungyeol’s playfulness in topic even if both of them are playing it straight in tone. “Well, you did make me do all the work every time either of us got off last night, and, honestly, I can’t think of a way that that’s going to happen again here unless you want me to hump you or something.”

That isn’t nearly as unappealing a thought as it might have once been—as it _would_ have once been—but that’s irrelevant. “So what you’re saying is, you don’t think I’m capable of being generous, too, is that it?”

Woohyun’s eyes are starting to dance, the dimple underneath his mouth popping up. “Yeah, that’s right. You’re a selfish bastard. All you do is take take take.”

“And I’m too lazy to work hard, right? Even at making my boyfriend happy?”

Again, something flickers in Woohyun’s eyes at the word ‘boyfriend,’ but he doesn’t let it derail him. “That’s right. I can see what this is: you’re keeping me around as your sex slave, and I’m supposed to get you off as often as you like, but you never have to lift a finger for me.”

Something deep inside Sungyeol is pricked by those words: he knows he isn’t as naturally selfless as Woohyun can be, always wanting to make other people happy, and he doesn’t love Woohyun like Woohyun loves him, and he wasn’t nearly as good to Woohyun last night as Woohyun was to him, and this whole thing sort of feels lopsided, actually, and he doesn’t like that, because Woohyun is important, important to Sungyeol, and Sungyeol does love him if not the way Woohyun wants him to (yet), and Woohyun deserves everything because he _gives_ everything, and Sungyeol _wants_ to make Woohyun happy the way Woohyun makes him happy. Maybe the weights aren’t quite in balance yet—maybe they won’t be for a while—but Sungyeol is going to do what he can to get them as close to even as possible.

Woohyun isn’t the only one who can be dedicated and hard-working.

Woohyun gasps, eyes flying wide (Sungyeol can’t see them from this angle, but he _knows_ ) when Sungyeol’s mouth latches onto the soft place by his arm that he’d sucked on last night. Sungyeol likes it, this little bit of softness that Woohyun hasn’t managed to exercise away, the vulnerability of this bit of him that none of the fans who scream over Woohyun’s body will ever know is there, because they can’t get close enough to him, not like Sungyeol can. Woohyun apparently likes it, too, because he’s squirming beneath Sungyeol, and he’s panting hard as Sungyeol slides his hands over every inch of Woohyun’s torso he can reach. Sungyeol sucks long enough to leave a mark, but it’s okay: he knows the schedules today, and none of them call for Woohyun to wear tank tops, so no one will ever know, no one but Sungyeol. And somehow he knows that Woohyun will never, ever complain about any marks Sungyeol leaves on him—as long as they won’t hurt Infinite (because Woohyun is Woohyun). Sungyeol suspects he might actually like them.

Woohyun is already mostly hard when Sungyeol finally detaches his mouth and then reaches down and takes Woohyun in his hand, and the way his hips jerk forward as soon as he feels the brush of Sungyeol’s fingers tells Sungyeol everything he needs to know. 

Woohyun is…really fucking hot with his head thrown back that way, the veins in his neck standing out with strain, his mouth open and gasping. His sweaty hair got pushed back from his forehead at some point and he’s not wearing any makeup and his eyes are only half-open and, yeah: he’s really fucking hot. Sungyeol feels like he’s learning to see him in a whole new way, like he’s using a pair of binoculars he’s only ever used to look at girls before and how he’s got them trained on Woohyun and…he likes what he sees.

He likes Woohyun’s hands clamping down on his hips, too, so hard and helpless that they might leave bruises, but they can’t stay that way if Sungyeol is going to do what he plans on doing, so he uses his free hand to pry them away and Woohyun, being Woohyun, takes the hint immediately, letting go as soon as he figures out what Sungyeol is asking. He lets out a little whine when Sungyeol removes his hand, but Sungyeol can tell it was unconscious, and he goes docilely when Sungyeol pushes him back onto the bed again.

It’s safe to say that Sungyeol has never, ever thought of sucking another guy’s dick, not until yesterday when Woohyun dumped the whole ‘Woohyun wants Sungyeol’ thing into his lap—and at that point it had mostly just flashed through his mind in an ‘ewww’ kind of way. But the thought has been bobbing and weaving through his mind since he said he’d choose Woohyun; as soon as he said that, it became a probability that sooner or later he and Woohyun would do this for each other. He hadn’t anticipated it quite so soon, but _fuck_ it had felt amazing when Woohyun did it for him, and he wants to be just as good to Woohyun as Woohyun is to him, not out of some sort of competition or even returning-the-favor, but because he cares about Woohyun and Woohyun deserves it.

He isn’t very impressed (though he’s definitely not disgusted) by the taste of Woohyun in his mouth, but the way Woohyun moans at the feeling is enough to render anything else irrelevant. Sungyeol tries to remember what Woohyun had done for him, though he hadn’t really been paying attention to anything but the feel of it at the time, so he’s mostly going by common sense and by what seems to make Woohyun shudder and groan. More suction is better, avoid the teeth, fit as much in as possible without choking yourself, remember to breathe: it’s not as complicated as Sungyeol might have feared (if he’d had time to really think about it) though his mouth does start to get tired after a while. But Woohyun is squirming and making desperate noises, and he has ways of letting Sungyeol know when he particularly likes something—though, honestly, he seems to be enjoying all of it.

And sometimes he’ll gasp Sungyeol’s name, not like he’s trying to get his attention, but like he likes the sound of it, like he’s trying to convince himself of something (of Sungyeol, of Sungyeol being here and doing this with him), like he thinks the word will keep Sungyeol close to him.

_I’m not going anywhere, Nam Woohyun._

And when the incredulous edge to Woohyun’s voice gets to be enough that it makes Sungyeol’s heart ache, he reaches up and takes Woohyun’s hand and tangles their fingers together. Woohyun clings to him without any shame, and he seems so helpless, like he thinks he’s going to be torn away if Sungyeol lets go of him, so Sungyeol doesn’t let go.

Even when that hand closes painfully tight around his and Woohyun chokes out a few half-formed warnings, even when Woohyun finds that he’s not pulling back and starts to jerk on his hand, even when Woohyun lets out a desperate sound so like the one he made last night when he was inside Sungyeol and yet so different, Sungyeol stays where he is, hand around Woohyun’s. He holds his hand while Woohyun’s body practically contorts in his pleasure; when he falls back onto the bed, overcome; when Sungyeol swallows as much of the unpleasantly salty liquid as he can and wipes the rest off his face with his free hand; when he climbs up to look down into Woohyun’s face and see how gorgeous he is in the aftermath (he’s learning to see it, and Sungyeol has always been a fast learner).

Woohyun squeezes his hand and reaches up to wipe at the side of Sungyeol’s mouth, and his eyes as they stare up at Sungyeol are worshipful and awed and dazed and humble all at once. The sight of those eyes knots something up inside of Sungyeol— _I don’t deserve that; I haven’t done the smallest bit for you of what you’ve done for me_ —and now is the moment when Woohyun is going to say something greasy, something that reminds Sungyeol of just how much Woohyun feels for him (that he doesn’t deserve) that he can’t return (yet), and Sungyeol isn’t sure he’ll be able to handle that and he almost wants to pull away.

But there’s still Woohyun’s hand in his and the smile Woohyun gives him is playful, like he knows Sungyeol can’t deal with anything else yet. “Maybe I’ll make you _my_ sex slave instead.”

Sungyeol snorts and drops his head to nudge his nose against the mark he left earlier (and maybe to cover up the way his cheeks are flushing with the compliment—it was his first time, after all). “I’d like to see you try.”

“I mean,” Woohyun continues, ignoring that comment and working the fingers of his free hand through Sungyeol’s hair, “it should basically be your job to give head. Your mouth is fucking _huge_ —I think that’s what you were designed to do.”

Sungyeol lets out a short laugh and looks up at him again. “Great. So next time an MC or a reporter asks me what my special talent that sets me apart from the rest of the members is, I’ll just say, ‘blowjobs.’”

“Blowjobs for _Woohyun_ ,” Woohyun corrects. “No one else is ever going to know how good you are at them. Only Woohyun.”

“Are you seriously talking in third person? Do you think you’re royalty or something?”

“Maybe I am.”

“Nope. _I’m_ the prince who was turned into a princess and then was fucked back into his true body by you, and you’re _my_ sex slave. Who I might also be nice to every once in a while and give blowjobs to. If he pleases me.”

Woohyun arches a brow. “Is that right?”

“Yeah. Non-negotiable. But there’s more to the story, actually.”

“Really.” Sungyeol can tell that Woohyun is trying to suppress a grin.

“Really. See, the slave is in love with his prince.”

“That’s sad,” Woohyun says, squeezing his hand. “Poor slave.”

Sungyeol shakes his head, squeezing back. “It’s only sad if the prince doesn’t love him back. Which he doesn’t at first. But sooner or later the prince falls in love with the slave.”

Woohyun’s eyes are smiling at him, and Sungyeol thinks he sees something inside Woohyun relax. _I’m not going anywhere, Nam Woohyun._ “Yeah?”

“Yeah. But it takes a little time.”

“Well, of course it does. It always does, if it’s real.”

“But, see, the slave once heard a prophecy about how the prince would one day fall in love with him, and so he knows it’s going to happen. So he doesn’t have to worry—he can just enjoy the time he gets to spend with the prince, because he knows one day the prince will love him back and free him and they’ll rule together.”

Woohyun’s eyes are shining now. “That’s a pretty good story. Like a fairy tale.”

Sungyeol laughs. “Except this isn’t one that people tell their kids before bedtime. It’s got way too much sex for that. Like, 29+ rating. Banned by the authorities. It’s not even allowed to be _mentioned_.”

“Well, that’s okay. As long as the prince and the slave know about it.”

“Yeah. It’s no one else’s business anyway.”

“Yeah, but the prince and the slave don’t get to stay alone forever—they have to go where they’re expected to be or the very grumpy prime minister will threaten them with violence.”

“Right, right. And the other members of the court will complain or make dirty jokes.”

“Besides, they need to tell everyone that the prince is back in his true body again—they’re all still back at the palace worried about it while the prince and the slave are...” Woohyun trails off.

“…Enjoying themselves in the woods,” Sungyeol finishes. 

“Right, so they have to get ready to journey back to the palace.”

“Finding the prince something to wear is going to be a challenge.”

“Eh, I think they’re up for it.”

“Does that mean you’re volunteering to wear the skirt?”

“In your dreams, Prince Sungyeol.”


	9. Epilogue

Sunggyu knows exactly what he should do when Sungyeol hangs up on him. He should tell the manager-hyungs right away, let them go over to Sungyeol’s hotel room and drag Woohyun back if necessary—at the very least he should call the hotel and ask for the line to Sungyeol’s room and threaten Woohyun till he agrees to return to the dorm.

Sunggyu _knows_ he should do that, and if you’d asked him before, he’d have replied without a moment’s hesitation that that’s exactly what he _would_ do. Sunggyu doesn’t play around when it comes to responsibilities to Infinite, and he doesn’t let his members play around either. He knows each and every rule, understands why they’re all in place, and he follows them, even the ones that infuriate him, and he makes sure his dongsaengs do, too.

There isn’t _technically_ a rule that forbids members from fooling around with each other, no line about it in their contracts (Sunggyu had read every word of his, so he knows), but that’s only because the unspoken taboo against it is so strong that there’s no need for it to be verbalized, and Sunggyu has never been one for following just the letter of the law. Inter-band relationships are dangerous—any relationship is dangerous to idols, but homosexual ones are the worst of all, and Sunggyu can’t even imagine what kind of a scandal would erupt if anyone ever found out about such an affair, but he knows—knows without question—that it would completely destroy Infinite. And Sunggyu would throw himself on a grenade if he needed to to protect Infinite.

So he hates himself even as he decides to let Woohyun and Sungyeol have this night. He _shouldn’t_ —there’s no legitimate reason at all for letting them, and he’s betraying all his leader responsibilities by doing so. But he trusts Woohyun, trusts him more than he’s ever trusted anyone, and more than that, he loves him. Their friendship hasn’t been an easy road: he remembers that once he hated Woohyun more than he thought he could hate anyone and even now there are times when things are strained between them. But even when he’d disliked Woohyun he’d respected him, because Woohyun’s dedication, his hard work, his talent, his eagerness to please had made not respecting him impossible. And now after everything they’ve been through together, after all they’ve accomplished, after everything Woohyun has sacrificed, Woohyun is his brother in all the ways that really matter, and Sunggyu loves him. 

He loves him, and he knows how much Woohyun gives up, how eagerly—even happily—Woohyun gives of himself for the sake of Infinite, for the sake of their fans. Woohyun makes himself into what he thinks others need him to be, with no thought to what he himself wants—or needs. Woohyun works so hard Sunggyu wouldn’t be surprised if one day he collapsed in exhaustion, he has never once betrayed Sunggyu’s trust in him (except for earlier today, when he kissed the man he loves, but Sunggyu isn’t so conservative that he doesn’t know that love is a different thing altogether), and he never asks for anything for himself. 

But Sunggyu wants him to have something. Something that will make _Woohyun_ happy. Not make him happy because he’s making other people happy; Woohyun is always experiencing his own happiness second-hand—except when Infinite succeeds and even then, his happiness is spread out through six other people and their support staff and their company and their fans and their families and everyone else who wants them to succeed—and Sunggyu wants, for once, for Woohyun to experience happiness that belongs _just to him_.

And Sungyeol, for reasons that Sunggyu will never understand, makes Woohyun happy. 

If you’d asked Sunggyu a few days ago whether he trusted Lee Sungyeol, he would have snorted in response. Sungyeol is everything that drives Sunggyu crazy: impulsive, heedless of authority, relentlessly optimistic, carelessly blunt, living in the moment. Sunggyu has never forgotten all the times Sungyeol packed his bags during their trainee days, the times Myungsoo or Dongwoo or Woohyun had to talk him into staying, the times he was threatened with being let go if he didn’t buckle down and prove he wanted to be there. Sunggyu won’t lie: he’s resented Sungyeol’s (seeming) lack of serious commitment, and he’s said so to Sungyeol’s face more than once (despite what people assume, Sungyeol’s lack of singing talent bothers Sunggyu far less, though it irritates him to no end that Sungyeol won’t invest the time and energy into improving). From the first day the new trainee was added to the Infinite roster, Sunggyu had expected him to just disappear one day: he clearly wasn’t cut out to be an idol and he didn’t want to be one in the first place. Even after they debuted, Sunggyu wouldn’t have been surprised if it was all too much for Sungyeol and he dropped out.

But Sunggyu can also admit that Sungyeol has surprised him in a lot of ways. He’s still here, for one thing, still giving to Infinite, too, and Sunggyu is beginning to understand that Sungyeol does work hard and he is committed, just in ways that Sunggyu will never understand. Sunggyu has stopped waiting for Sungyeol to throw in the towel, and now as he remembers how happy Sungyeol had sounded on the phone as he gleefully informed his leader that Woohyun would be staying with him tonight, Sunggyu realizes he does trust Lee Sungyeol after all. And maybe with something even more important than Infinite, if that’s even possible.

Sunggyu isn’t going to think about what Woohyun and Sungyeol will get up to tonight ( _God_ , no). He isn’t going to explain to the rest of the kids where Woohyun is and why, no matter how annoying their questions get (a little unsatisfied curiosity never killed anyone, and it’s none of their business anyway). He isn’t going to worry about Sungyeol shattering Woohyun’s heart or the two of them getting caught in a hotel, because somehow he knows he doesn’t need to worry about those things: he trusts them both. Sunggyu isn’t much of one for trusting instinct—that’s Sungyeol’s territory—but right now…he’s going with his. He’s going to leave Woohyun and Sungyeol alone in that hotel room and trust that they’ll take care of each other and that Woohyun will make it back in time for schedules tomorrow. He’s going to do that, despite every one of his responsible inclinations screaming at him.

“The things I do for you, Nam Woohyun,” he mutters, tossing his phone down and flopping back on the bed.

 

 

When Woohyun and Sungyeol stumble into the dorm just moments before the members have to leave for their first schedule, Sungyeol dressed in mismatched and ill-fitting clothing (from the lost and found at the hotel, Sungyeol explains later), Sunggyu is mostly just relieved they made it on time—and also partly wondering how they’re going to get them showered before the van is ready (and, yes, pathetically grateful that he can’t see any visible love-bites or nail-scratches or anything else too horrifying, though he’s not impressed with how messy Sungyeol’s hair is. And okay, maybe also just a little bit of him relaxes at the matching grins on Woohyun and Sungyeol’s faces and the way their hands keep brushing against each other in a subtle enough way that Sunggyu is the only one who’d notice, but he’s not about to admit to that).

But then Sungjong lets out a gasped, “Hyung!” and Dongwoo bursts into excited laughter, clapping his hands and breaking into a happy dance, and Myungsoo hurls himself across the room and plasters himself onto Sungyeol, and Hoya shouts, “You’re back!” and then it hits Sunggyu: _Sungyeol is back in his own body_.

Chaos reigns for a while after that, and for once Sunggyu lets himself get caught up in it (after all, it isn’t every day that one of your dongsaengs turns back into a guy after being in a female body for almost a week). Sungjong keeps demanding to know how it happened and Hoya is cracking more dirty jokes and pounding Sungyeol on the back and Dongwoo keeps grabbing at various parts of Sungyeol’s body (no doubt to convince himself that Sungyeol really is back to himself) and getting his hands playfully slapped away by a grinning Woohyun and Myungsoo is still clinging to Sungyeol like a limpet and Sungyeol is trying to pry him off but he’s laughing and Woohyun is trying to explain to Sungjong that they just don’t _know_ what happened any more than they knew what made the transformation happen in the first place and Sunggyu finds that he’s got his arm around Woohyun’s shoulder without even thinking about it and that he’s smiling at Sungyeol (Woohyun whispers a fierce, “Thank you, hyung,” against Sunggyu’s ear, and maybe that makes how much he beat himself up last night over his failures as a leader worth it. Yeah, it probably does). 

But even in the delirium of celebration, there’s a small part of Sunggyu that’s reminding him that this can’t last long. In a minute, they’ll have to settle down and send Woohyun and Sungyeol to the showers to get cleaned up as quickly as possible. In a minute, they’ll have to rush down to the vans and tell the hyungs that they’re all back and speed all the way to make it to their schedule on time. In a minute, they’ll have to be idols, with all the duties and obligations that word carries with it.

In just a minute.


End file.
